A Dimmed Beacon (OldMoved)
by CrimsonSkies45
Summary: (This story is being rewritten and has been abandoned. As the Beacon Falls is the current story) Ichigo along with Rukia, Tatsuki,and Orihime enter Beacon Academy in hopes of receiving the needed training and knowledge in order to become a Hunter and Huntresses. After all what is the worst that could happen at such a prestigious academy?
1. Welcome to Beacon

AN: This is my first fanfiction so I hope you enjoy it and feedback is appreciated. Also this story is inspired by some others just wanted to point that out in case there are some similarities between this story and another one, anyways hope you guys enjoy!

* * *

 **Welcome To Beacon…**

The most prominent thing about him was his bright orange hair being near impossible to miss as he leaned against the nearest wall, Ichigo Kurosaki, first-year student at Beacon Academy, as he looked around his scowl deepened.

'Where the hell are they at?', his trip to Beacon was supposed to be with three other people whom he was rather close with. He stood in place trying to think were they could be at.

'There is way too many people to look for them...Did they… no there is no way they actually missed the airship right?'

"Oi carrot top!", he was brought out of his thoughts as a familiar voice called him by a name that he wasn't all too fond of.

"So midget where did you wander off to?", he looked down at the black haired girl that at the moment was trying her hardest not to snap out at him.

"Me? You're the one who didn't leave when we had planned to!"

"Well you're just slower than I thought you were, guess I should've taken those little legs of yours into account huh," The previous statement was all it took to push her over the edge, she was seriously going to kill him!

"They're over here Tatsuki, just follow me!", the small disagreement was halted by two girls running over to the pair.

"There you are! Did you seriously ditch us Ichigo? It's good thing Rukia found you first because I'm getting fed up with this!", the orange haired teen put his hands up.

"Woah take it easy Tatsuki, I figured you guys would catch up even if I left a bit early...by the way did your hair get longer?"

"Don't start trying to change the subject! But yes, yes it did," pulling a long strand of hair hanging in his face.

"Same could be said for you," turning to the orange haired girl next to her, "So what do you think of long haired Ichigo Hime?", the girl in question turned a bit red as she attempted to answer the question.

"I t-think it looks good o-", her sentence was cut off by a news broadcast which included subjects such as: Roman Torchwhick,a criminal who led a robbery on a dust shop and somehow hasn't been caught, followed by a report of a fanus civil rights protest turned violent when the White Fang showed up, the report was cut off as a projection of a blonde weapon with glasses appeared in it's place.

"Hello and welcome to Beacon. My name is Glynda Goodwitch. You are among a privileged few who received the honor of being selected to attend this prestigious academy. Our world is experiencing an incredible time of peace, and as future Huntsman and Huntresses, it your duty to uphold it. You have demonstrated the courage needed for such a task, and now it is our turn to provide you with the knowledge and the training to protect our world.", the projection fades a few seconds later as the students are provided with a breathtaking view of Vale.

* * *

The airship soon lands at Beacon, as students begin to pour out of the aircraft the group notices a blond boy rush towards the nearest trash can.

"View ain't for everyone I guess," continuing forward Ichigo and his group follow the crowd into an assembly hall. They stood in the room for a good ten minutes as they waited for the rest of the students to gather before the headmaster began to speak,.

"I'll keep this brief. You have travelled here in search of knowledge. To hone your craft and acqu-", the orange haired teen couldn't listen to another word, speeches just weren't his thing not to mention this guy was giving off a vibe like ole' hat and clogs back home which certainly wasn't a good thing. He attempted to listen to the man...but failed miserably, the speech just really couldn't grab his attention.

'Whatever. It's not like he's saying anything important.'

* * *

"Ichigo!", a shrill voice brought him out of his daze as his eyes began to dart around in confusion before landing on Tatsuki.

"Oh 's up?", he asked in a casual tone as the girl glared at him.

"What's up? We have to go to the ballroom! Didn't you listen at at all?", Ichigo's even more confused expression made it clear that he didn't. Tatsuki groaned as she beckoned for him to follow her.

"C'mon, I told the others I'd make sure you get there," he shrugged as he followed closely, not wanting to further anger the girl.

* * *

The group had gotten set up in the ballroom along with the rest of the first-year students, the three females had told Ichigo to go somewhere as to change and so he did. He took off his shirt, as he looked around, he noticed a blonde girl who was staring at him like a predator sizing up its meal. Ichigo's face went red as he grabbed a plain white T shirt and a pair of shorts, he then proceeded to change into the apparel he had chosen to sleep with great speed due to the constant staring of the girl; he walked back over to the area where his teammates decided to set up at and looked around quickly once more. Low and behold, the same girl was still looking at him, only this time she winked at him, causing Ichigo's face to go as red as his name may imply.

'This damn pervert!", Ichigo quickly dove for the covers, so he may be out of the girl's line of sight. He laid there for a minutes before muttering under his breath.

"Welcome to Beacon…", he softly chuckled to himself before falling asleep.

* * *

An: And there is chapter one! I hope it was okay, despite being so short alright see you guys next time. (Edit:9/19/16, I've added to/ rewritten portions of the first chapter in an attempt to make it better, because after reading it again...it was pretty bad.)


	2. The Emerald Forest Part 1

The Emerald Forest Part 1

* * *

The following morning was easily one of the most stressful Ichigo has had in a long time, the first-year students around him were extremely rowdy with varying reasons ranging from some idiot boosting about 'how easy the initiation test was going to be' to a few students having a panic attack about the possibility of getting booted onto the first airship out of Beacon.

'Those idiots need to relax...and the other ones need to calm down.'

* * *

Ichigo sighed at the memories of the morning as he got into his combat gear which consisted of black and red combat boots, black cargo pants and to top it all off a black long coat with a red and white trim towards the bottom.

"Can't forget this," reaching into the ridiculously high-tech locker he grabbed the giant sword he had dubbed "Zangetsu" before placing it on his back and slamming the locker shut.

As he walked away from his locker a familiar voice beckoned for him.

"Ichigo come over," sighing before making his way over to the source.

"What do you want Rukia?", pointing behind her she spoke.

"I'd like you to meet some pe-"

"Wow he's even better looking up close!", turning his gaze away from Rukia and to the blonde girl he scowled.

"You're the pervert who was checking me out last night!", with a shrug she replied to his little accusation.

"What can I say ya got nice abs," Ichigo's face had taken a red hue from her last comment.

"Aww you're embarrassed that's so cute! Anyways I'm Yang and that's my baby sister, Ruby." pointing to a younger girl with black hair that seemed to fade into red towards the tips who decided to chime in by putting her hand out.

"It's nice to meet you Ichigo!", taking her hand and shaking gently, "Same here."

* * *

The group soon afterwards met up with Tatsuki and Orihime, who seemed to get along wonderfully with the sisters wonderfully, along with Jaune Arc, the boy who darted towards the nearest trash can when they first arrived, who was brutally rejected by some stuck up girl named Weiss; as the group made their way towards the cliffs Ichigo noticed Ruby constantly staring at him which made him a tad bit uncomfortable.

"Uh Ruby is there something on my clothes or something?", unsurprisingly Yang interjected.

"She's probably looking at the giant sword on your back. Ruby is a weapons fanatic," turning to Ruby, who was currently beaming at him, he grabbed his weapon and held it up.

"Well this is Zangetsu...umm do you want to hold it or something?", the shorter girl nodded in excitement before being pulled to the ground by the weapon as she attempted to hold it. Ruby groaned as she tried to pick it up...and failing miserably before deciding to make a distressed plea for her sister's assistance who seemed to accept the challenge with a grin on her face.

"Alright stand back sis, I got this," this statement would prove to be false.

* * *

It's been 10 minutes since the blonde had taken the challenge of lifting Zangetsu and with a war cry she manages to lift to a few inches off the ground.

"Alright that's enough," Ichigo grasped the sword by the hilt and yanked it from Yang as she kneeled on the ground and panted.

"What is that thing made of?!", Jaune looked horrified by the sheer size of the blade as the orange haired teen shrugged as he placed the blade on his back.

"Steel and a few other things. Now c'mon we need to go the cliffs," before following Yang looked at Rukia who simply shrugged.

* * *

Shortly afterwards all of the first-year students had gathered at the cliffs overlooking the Emerald Forest Ozpin began with another speech.

"For years you have trained to become warriors. And today your abilities will be evaluated in the Emerald Forest." the students stood at attention as he finished speaking which is when Professor Goodwitch stepped forward whilst grasping a table.

"Now, I'm sure many of you have heard rumors about the assignment of teams. Well, allow us to put an end to your confusion. Each of you will be given teammates today," Ruby responded to this with some sort of noise that indicated her fear. Ozpin then began to speak once more.

"These teammates will be with you for the rest of your time here at Beacon. So it is in your best interest to be paired with someone with whom you can work well," miss Rose let another noise before he continued to speak.

"That being said, the first person you make eye contact with after landing will be your partner for the next four years," the students briefly voiced their approvals and disapprovals of the system,

"After you've partnered up, make your way to the northern end of the forest. You will meet opposition along the way. Do not hesitate to destroy everything in your path, or you will die," Jaune nervously laughed in fear at the last bit.

"You will be monitored and graded for the duration of your initiation. But our instructors will not intervene. You will find an old temple at the end containing several relics. Each pair must chose one and return to the top of the cliff. We will regard you and that item, as well as your standing, and grade you appropriately. Are there any questions?", Jaune nervously raised his hand.

"Yea, um, sir-," he was quickly cut off by Ozpin,

"Good now take your positions," each student, with the exception of Jaune got into a stance to brace themselves.

Jaune held his hand up and spoke in an extremely nervous tone.

"Um sir, I've got, um, a question," the first student was then launched from the cliff into the forest via the platform they were standing on,

"So, this landing strategy thing, uh, w-what is it? You're like dropping us off or something?", Ozpin quickly responded.

"No, you will be falling."

"Oh, I see. So, like, did you hand out parachutes for us?"

"No, you will be using your own landing strategy."

"Oh, uh, so what exactly is a landing stra-," Jaune was cut off by his own screaming as he was thrown into the air along side the other first-year students.

* * *

AN: Alright there's the second chapter, hope you guys are enjoying this so far. Also please make sure to leave some feedback, it helps me tremendously when someone leaves some advice or a suggestion. 'Til next update see ya!


	3. The Emerald Forest Part 2

**The Emerald Forest Part 2**

* * *

The platforms that the first-year students were launched from had a surprising amount of force behind them, the fact that the contraption was able to launch a human being from a cliffside with enough force to actually keep them in the air for a considerable amount of time but this was proven further.

"Birdy no!", Ruby shouted this as she completely obliterated a black bird, that had the misfortune of being in the air at the time, upon her descend into the Emerald Forest. The other students handled their landing in a number of different ways for example: Lie Ren used his Storm Flower's blades to spiral around a tree before landing safely on the ground and then there was Jaune...he was pinned to a tree by Pyrrah Nikos' Miló in it's javelin form; now,whilst falling at high speeds, it was Ichigo's turn to form a landing strategy.

' _Damn it! Come on, think, think!'_ , at this point he was practically screaming at his brain to go into overdrive in hopes of hatching an efficient landing strategy then it hit him.

' _Zangetsu, there is cloth wrapped around its handle!'_ , without a second a thought Ichigo lifted the blade from his back and then grasping the cloth hanging from the handle, he proceeded to swing the blade back and forth before it picked up some momentum and began to spin.

* * *

"Damn, that killed my calfs," Ichigo tugged at the cloth with all of his might in order to unlodge Zangetsu from the tree trunk in was currently stuck in.

"That could've gone a whole lot better...then again it could have gone worse," he began to mentally kick himself for using that landing strategy, the force of his descent and the strain it put on his hands and legs was enough to make him regret his decision of throwing his blade at a tree.

"Hope the others are doing alright, 'cause this already turning out to be a huge pain in the ass for me," resting Zangetsu on his shoulder, he began to move forward.

* * *

His temper was running extremely short at the moment, his little search for a familiar face has gone on for about 10 minutes now...with no progress.

"Rukia! Tatsuki! Orihime! Anyone?!", there was some rustling in the bushes followed by glaring red eyes and growling.

"You've gotta be kidding," a small Beowolf lunged from the bushes however its strike didn't quite reach Ichigo seeing as Zangetsu intercepted the creature in mid-air, cleaving in half.

"Alright who's next?", he yelled at the pack with confidence as they emerged from the bushes with less than friendly intentions.

* * *

The scenery of the Emerald Forest is simply breathtaking, in all honesty it would be a great place to relax...well if there wasn't Grimm lurking around every corner. Rukia let out a sigh as she continued to march forward.

"Such a shame," she brushed off her previous thoughts of the forest and focused on the task at hand.

"Ozpin said the temple was on the northern end of the forest, so, it can't be much further from he-," she was cut off by a glowing blue crescent of aura tearing through a few trees along with a familiar voice letting out a triumphant shout.

"Next time you bastards should just stay outta the way!", no doubt about it, Ichigo is close by. Rukia picked up the pace a bit as she headed towards the direction of his shout; she quickly caught a glimpse of some bright orange hair.

"Ichigo, over here!", she yelled as loud as she could which seemed to work absurdly well, seeing as she quickly got a response.

"Rukia is that you?!", it was in this moment that Rukia realized how dumb he could be at times.

"What do you think!", her sassy reply caused Ichigo to scoff as he walked towards her.

"Sorry, I just had to make sure that I didn't discover some new species of short creatures that could talk," his face had a prideful smirk on it as Rukia let out a groan that signaled how annoyed the previous statement made her.

"Just shut up and follow me. We shouldn't be too far from the temple now," Ichigo followed as she began to walk.

"About how long should it be until we get there?"

"I'd guess around five to ten minutes," Ichigo groaned as the kept on walking.

"Any way we could cut back on the time?", he asked in hopes of her actually having a shortcut or something, at the moment he had dealt with all the wildlife he could handle and just wanted to get out of this damn forest.

"Quit your complaining. It isn't that far away."

"Oh bite me, you angry midget," she turned around and childishly stuck her tongue out at him.

* * *

"We there yet?", Ichigo asked impatiently as Rukia groaned.

"We've only been walking for five minutes! I said it could take up to ten minutes fool."

"Don't call me a fool you damn midget," she chuckled at his insult as she turned her head towards him with a spiteful look on her face.

"Can't you think of anything better than 'midget'? Or are you that unoriginal carrot top?"

"Didn't you contradict yourself right there? I mean you've called me 'carrot top' at least as many times as I've called you a midget if not more."

"Oh will you just shut up!", the orange haired teen shrugged and just marched forward until Rukia stopped dead in her tracks and put her arm out.

"Did you hear that?", listening closely, Ichigo could hear the bushes rustle.

"Yea, I do," he brought Zangetsu in front of him as he grasped it with both of his hand before getting into a defensive stance.

"It's big, if I had to guess I'd say it's an Ursa," Rukia quickly drew the katana she had strapped her hip before her eyes began to dart around in an attempt to find the creature that was coming towards them.

"Rukia!", her eyes snapped to the left as she saw blade coming towards her. Bringing the blade of katana up to her face as the sword like blade made contact, the force pushing her back a few feet as she looked up at the grotesque creature. This thing before them was not like any other Grimm that has been documented, it was far too human like in appearance if you could even use the term human in this scenario. The torso of this said Grimm was almost identical to a thinner human...if they were cover in an exoskeleton and had arms that went down to their ankles. It let out a distorted, high-pitched roar as its sickly thin fingers tightened around the short sword that was in its grasp.

"Hope you're ready for this," Rukia clutched her blade tightly as Ichigo spoke those words.

"Of course I am. Now dance Sode no Shirayuki!", frost covered the blade before revealing the pure white blade. Ichigo smirked as he glared at their opponent.

"Alright, let's go!"

* * *

The pair were panting heavily as they attempted to catch their breathe, it was way too strong, Grimm like this were supposed to be outside of the walls away from civilization but somehow this one was in the Emerald Forest just outside of Beacon.

"What the hell is up with that thing?", Ichigo was amazed by the Grimm's durability which caused half of their attacks to have little to no effect at all.

"I-I have no idea. I just hope the wall is going to hold up," the wall she spoke of was a giant formation of ice Rukia had created with the use of her semblance and the dust in her sword in order to distance themselves from the creature that lurked on the other side.

"No point in sitting around anymore. That thing could bust that thing down any minute now, so, our best bet is to be ready to fight," using Zangetsu to support himself as he stood up, Ichigo put himself into a combat stance in anticipation of the Grimm breaking through.

"You know you're insane sometimes...but, I suppose you're right," she stood up before bringing Sode no Shirayuki to a kendo stance. The pair sat there for a good minute or so before there was an audible crack as the ice began to break.

"Here it comes!", Rukia shouted as she put on a death grip on her sword.

"Alright, I've had enough of this asshole!", in a quick motion, Ichigo pointed his blade at the Grimm as it barreled through the barrier. He grabbed his wrist as his blade began to glow blue.

" **Bankai!"**

* * *

 **AN:** **Alright there it is! Chapter 3...with a cliffhanger. And before anyone asks the question, I will explain how Shikai and Bankai works in this story. Now then see ya guys next time!**


	4. Darkness Dances Upon The Winter Wind

**Darkness Dances Upon The Winter Wind**

* * *

Black and red Aura erupted from the blade and began to flow throughout the frost covered section of the forest. The scene that was unfolding in front of Rukia's eye was surreal to say the least, the amount of Aura that was flooding the air was enough to leave a person speechless but the contrast of the dark Aura flowing against the ice that covered the nearby trees made it even more breathtaking; the scene was cut short as a black blade cut through the air, revealing Ichigo's new weapon.

"Say hello to Tensa Zangetsu," the new blade's appearance was the polar opposite of Zangetsu, the shape of the blade was now identical to that of a katana and this new "Tensa Zangetsu" now brandished a manji shaped guard oppose to the previous guardless monster of a blade. He held the blade in pride as he wore a look of determination; Ichigo dug his boots deeply into the guard before dashing directly at the Grimm. The beast brought its blade down upon the orange haired teen however it was met by his own. With an audible groan, Ichigo pushed the creature back before planting a slash on its torso and another one on the forearm.

"Alright ugly, let's finish this!", Ichigo grasped his blade tightly before charging in for another assault.

* * *

Rukia couldn't believe what she was seeing, just a moment ago Ichigo and her were having such a hard time handling this creature but now he was hardly breaking a sweat as the Grimm exchanged blows with him. It was amazing but that wasn't what had her so baffled.

"Since when did you have a Bankai?!", Ichigo snapped his head back at her and sighed.

"Are you serious right now? Do you not see me fighting the Grimm that has a fucking sword?", Rukia shouted once more.

"Just answer the damn question!", Ichigo shook his head as he parried another blow from the creature.

"Goat chin had it forged for me as a gift for getting accepted into Beacon! There, happy now?", unfortunately he thought that this would be the end of the discussion but as fate would have it, it wasn't.

"I barely got a 'Congratulations Rukia!' from my brother and your dad gives you a bankai ?!", Ichigo was flabbergasted by the fact she was getting jealous right now, not only that is was getting annoying.

"Yea, yea. Now can you just wait until I kill this thing, please?", the short girl pouted slightly as the sound of metal clashing echoed throughout the forest. With a heavy slash, Ichigo managed to put a deep slash in the Grimm's mid-section as it let out an extremely loud cry of pain before smacking the bright haired teen to the side. He quickly stood up as he noticed a slight glow coming from his peripheral vision; the Grimm was doing the impossible, bright cyan Aura was gathering at the tip of its blade before shortly releasing in a beam like attack. Ichigo barely evaded the blast as he ran directly at the beast before plunging the blade of Tensa Zangetsu into Grimm's chest.

"Getsuga Tensho!", black and red Aura tore through its chest leaving behind a hole in its place before it fell to the ground; the Grimm's body evaporated into a black mist leaving behind the body of a girl, who couldn't have been any older than 15, with a mask on her face that was identical to the one that belonged to the recently deceased creature. Ichigo slowly backed away from her body in horror.

"A Vizard," he spoke in a low whisper as Rukia looked at him in confusion.

"Ichigo, what the hell just happened? And what is a Vizard?", Ichigo had begun to walk away from the body, beckoning for her to follow.

"Ichigo answer me!", he stopped for a moment to speak.

"I'll...I'll tell you some other time. Let's just go get that relic," Rukia took a look at the body of the masked girl before deciding to follow him.

* * *

Ozpin stood beside Glynda as she looked in awe at the screen of her tablet.

"The Vizards...they're real…", Ozpin took a sip from his coffee mug before speaking.

"Such a shame. If only we had found her before any of this could've happened," he turned to Glynda with a calm glance.

"Have someone collected the body as soon as the students are out of the forest."

"But Professor Ozpin what if one of the other groups find it?", Ozpin simply shook his head.

"If they keep on their current route then none of the other groups should be within a 30 yard radius of that area. But if a group does get too close to the area then we'll have someone dispatched immediately," looking at the forest once more he calmly spoke.

"After all we don't want this to be made into a bigger situation than it already is.'

* * *

There was an incredibly uncomfortable silence between the two as they continued onward. Rukia's mood was lifted up a bit as she looked into the distance.

"Ichigo, the ruins!", she darted ahead as she signaled him to follow, without fail Ichigo managed to stay within a foot of her as they sprinted towards the clearing. Rukia came to a halt as she saw a stone structure, Ichigo swiftly walked past her.

"Come on, let's get the relic and haul ass outta here," the relics became fully visible as he walked over to the ruins.

' _Chess pieces? Not what I was expecting but okay,'_ after examining the pieces that were carefully placed on the stone pedestals, his hand snatched the black rook piece. A light rustling could be heard as he placed the piece into his pocket; Ichigo grasped Tensa Zangetsu with both hands as he prepared for the possible encounter to come. The rustling subsided as the cause stepped out from the bushes, Orihime and Tatsuki. The two looked just as surprised as Ichigo and Rukia as they stared at each other in silence for a good six seconds...that is before Ichigo tossed the remaining black rook at Tatsuki, who wasn't all too thrilled by the gesture.

"Hey, what's the big idea!", Ichigo sighed as he began to walk away from the ruins.

"You were taking too long to pick a relic. Now c'mon and we can get the hell outta here," Tatsuki rolled her eyes at him before following behind Rukia; as if it waiting for the perfect time to strike, an Ursa emerged from the forest, which earned an annoyed groan from Ichigo.

"We're going through so go piss off!", the blade of Tensa Zangetsu was engulfed by black and red Aura as he charged at the enormous beast.

* * *

Applause filled the auditorium as Ozpin spoke.

"Russel Thrush. Cardin Winchester. Dove Bronzewind, Sky Lark. The four of you retrieved the black bishop pieces. From this day forward, you will work together as team CRDNL. Lead by Cardin Winchester," the images of the four students faded from the giant screen as new ones appeared followed by the corresponding students walking onto the stage.

"Jaune Arc. Lie Ren. Pyrrah Nikos. Nora Valkyrie. The four of you retrieved the white rook pieces. From this day forward, you will work as team JPNR," Nora quickly latched herself to Ren whilst giggling as the auditorium began to applaud before Ozpin began to speak once more.

"Lead by Jaune Arc!", Jaune looked at him with a confused expression on his face.

"Lead by…"

'Congratulations, young man," Jaune looked at Pyrrah who proceeded to playfully punch him in the shoulder...which resulted in him falling on his rear as some scattered laughter ensued; Ozpin turned his attention away from them as another team walked onto the stage.

"Tatsuki Arisawa. Orihime Inoue. Rukia Kuchiki. Ichigo Kurosaki. The four of you retrieved the black rook pieces. From this day forward, you will work as team RIOT. Lead by Rukia Kuchiki," Ichigo chuckled a bit at the name as he looked at his new teammates.

"Hey, at least it fits," they stepped off stage to make room for the next team.

"And finally, Blake Belladona. Ruby Rose. Weiss Schnee. And Yang Xiao Long. The four of you retrieved the white knight pieces. From this day forward, you will work as team RWBY. Lead by Ruby Rose," Yang quickly embraced her sister in excitement and yelled.

"I'm so proud of you!", Ozpin looked at them before calmly speaking.

"Looks like things are shaping up to be an interesting year…"

* * *

"What do you think Ozpin called us up here for?", Rukia looked at Ichigo as he asked and shook her head.

"I don't know...unless," her sentence was cut off by the opening of the elevator doors.

"Ah and , come on.", the pair did as he instructed.

"Now I assume that know that I called you both up here to discuss the incident in the Emerald Forest correct?", the two nodded as he stared at them.

"Good. Now I need you two to never speak of this matter to anyone, not even your teammates," Ichigo's eyes widened in shock.

"What do you mean? Everyone has the right to know about what happened to that Vizard!", Ichigo's voice was a tad bit harsh as he screamed at the headmaster, whom remained calm despite the shouting.

"Calm down, they will know eventually. It's just that we don 't know too much about the Vizards which can pose a problem. Think about it . If we were to leak this information at this very instance, how do you think people would react? The confirmed existence of a group of people who were cable of fighting Grimm without Dust. Along with the fact that this particular Vizard had gone berserk and attempted to kill you both," Rukia stared silently at Ozpin as Ichigo was left speechless by his words.

"I-I didn't consider that...I'm so-," Ozpin raised his hand.

"No need for apologies. You're still young. I wouldn't expect you to think of every possible scenario for a situation," Turning himself away from the window, he looked at the two of them.

"Now go back to your dorms and get some rest. After all classes do start tomorrow," the pair nodded as they left the office.

* * *

Whilst walking back to their dorm room, Ichigo and Rukia ran into a familiar face, Ruby Rose, who greeted them cheerfully.

"Ichigo, Rukia! What are you guys doing out here?", Ichigo smiled a bit as he thought of the similarities between Ruby and his younger sister Yuzu.

"Just going for a relaxing walk," he crouched down to her height and asked, "And why are you at here at this hour?", Ruby chuckled as she rubbed the back of head.

"Well I was just so excited about being here at Beacon that I just had to some exploring before I went to sleep," Ichigo stood up.

"Alright, catch you later then," he began to walk away before stopping again.

"Oh and by the way, when are you going to introduce us to the rest of your team?"

"Hopefully tomorrow. But only if I get to meet your's too!", Ichigo chuckled a bit as Rukia began to walk ahead.

"Aright you will, you will," turning his attention back to walking back to the dorms, he noticed that Rukia managed to get a good twenty feet ahead.

"Hey wait up you damn midget!"

* * *

 **AN:** **Everyone is outta the forest and on teams, life is good. But on a serious note, I've noticed how short my chapters have been so I will be striving to make each chapter longer than the previous one...so, hope you enjoyed this chapter as well as this story in general! See ya guys next time.**


	5. Academic Responsibility

**Academic Responsibility**

* * *

The sun was shining, the birds were singing and team RIOT was fast asleep but not for long. A loud thumping could be heard as Ichigo's eyes snapped open, he got ready to kick his father as he did every morning however he soon remembered that he was in his team's dorm before looking around the room in confusion.

"Where did that noise come from?", the a light rustling of sheets as his teammates woke up; Orihime looked at Ichigo as he got out of bed and continued to search the room for the source of the noise.

"What's wrong Ichigo?", he continued his little search as he replied.

"There was a noise that woke me up. So, I'm trying to find where it ca-"

"Good morning team RWBY!", Ichigo deeply exhaled as he heard the familiar but muffled voice from down the hall.

"So, that's what it was," he looked at the clock before he quickly reached for his uniform.

"It's 8:39!", Rukia groaned as she rummaged through her belongings in search for her uniform.

"Well there goes my plan of getting an early start on the first day," Ichigo groaned out of irritation as he walked towards the restroom whilst shouting.

"On our way to class, we're filing a complaint with our neighbors!"

* * *

Team RWBY was currently finishing crafting some makeshift bunk beds, which were incredibly dangerous, looking at the pair of contraptions, Ruby nodded and spoke cheerfully.

"Objective complete!", one of the bunkbeds was literally just a bed being held up by rope and the other one was being held up a large stack of books; before they could move, a loud knock came from the door followed which when opened revealed the entirety of team RIOT. Ruby practically squealed in delight as she dragged them into the room before clearing her throat.

"Ichigo, Rukia these are my other teammates, Blake and Weiss," they just kind of waved at them, uncomfortably. Ichigo looked at them and sighed before speaking.

"Alright this is Orihime," she giggled and waved cheerfully when he mentioned her name, "And this is Tatsuki," she waved slowly whilst showing her discomfort as Rukia stepped forward before speaking with authority.

"Ruby, I'm going to have to ask you to refrain from being so loud in the morning. Frankly it's a tad bit annoying," Ruby gasped.

"I'm so sorry! I really am. I didn't realize we were being that loud and I'll make sure it doesn't happened again and I'm really, really, really , really sorry about this! I'm seriously re-", the members of team RIOT looked at one another before Ichigo looked at Yang.

"Does she normally do that?", he asked as the young girl rambled on. With a sigh Yang replied.

"Yea, yea she does...she feels really bad when she does anything wrong," the orange haired teen looked at Ruby before he and his team slowly backed out of the room.

"I can see that...Ruby, you can stop now!", she stopped talking and stiffened up in a similar stance to a how a new recruit in the military would stand; before they fully left the room, Tatsuki called out.

"By the way it's 8:55!", team Rwby froze up before quickly bolting out of the room to follow behind them as team JPNR also began to run to class as Jaune yelled.

"We're gonna be late!"

* * *

"Monsters! Demons. Prowlers of the night. Yes, the creatures of Grimm have many names. But I merely refer to them as prey," Professor Port let out a hardy chuckled causing Ruby to wake up from the little nap she was taking at her seat; the apparent joke he made was poorly received as the students remained deadly silent before he awkwardly began once more.

"Uhh, and you shall too, upon graduating from this prestigious academy. Now as I was saying, Vale, as well as the other three kingdoms are safe havens in an otherwise treacherous world. Our planet is absolutely teeming with creatures that would love nothing more than to tear you to pieces. And that's where we come in. Huntsman! Huntress…", he winked at Yang whilst clicking his tongue which caused the blonde to uncomfortably chuckle and roll her eyes before he began to speak again.

"Individuals who have sworn to protect those who cannot protect themselves. From what you ask? Why… The very world!", a student let out a shout of approval as the others silently looked at him before he sat back down as Professor Port started his little speech once more.

"That is what you are training to become. But, first a story. A tale of a young, handsome man. Me, when I was a boy-", Weiss actually attempted to pay attention to his tale however she was distracted by the sound of Ruby scribbling on paper before looking away to listen once more.

"Despite smelling of cabbages, my grandfather was a wise man. 'Peter', he told me-", Weiss's attention was taken by Ruby laughing at herself before looking her way. Ruby lifted up the paper and smiled as she showed the white haired girl the crude drawing of Professor Port before making a fart noise which cause her and Yang to start laughing before the Professor cleared his throat to gain their attention and then turning away to finish his tale.

"In the end the Beowolf was no match for my sheer tenacity. And I returned to my village with the beast in captivity and my head held high. Celebrated, as a hero.", he then proceeded to bow before deciding to speak again.

"The moral of this story? A true Huntsman must be honorable," Ruby was balancing an apple on a book on a pencil as she made an odd face with her eyes crosses as Weiss glared at her, gritting her teeth while Professor Port continued to speak.

"A true Huntsman must be dependable," Weiss continued to glare at the now sleeping Ruby as the speech went on.

"A true Huntsman must be strategic. Well educated. And wise!", Ruby was currently picking her nose as Weiss looked about ready to explode in rage.

"So, who among you believes themselves to be the embodiment of these traits?", Weiss hand quickly shoots up as she bitterly speaks.

"I do sir!", Ichigo rolls his eyes before whispering to his teammates.

"This oughtta be good," Port stared at Weiss as he spoke once more.

"Well then let's find out. Step forward, and face your opponent," he beckons to the rattling cage besides him as he speaks.

* * *

Weiss stands across from the cage with Myrtenaster in hand as the beast in the cage growls...and as her teammates began to cheer her on.

"Go Weiss!", said Yang as she thrusted her fist into the air. Blake held a little red flag that read "Rwby" on it as she shouted.

"Fight well!"

"Yea, represent team RWBY!", Ruby raised her arms into the air as she shouted before Weiss looked back at her.

"Ruby, I'm trying to focus," Rwby looked like a kicked puppy as she brought leaned back in her seat a bit.

"Oh, uhm, sorry."

"Alright, let the match begin!", Professor Port cut the lock off of the cage. As the door quickly slammed onto the ground, a rather large Boarbatusk began to charge at her whilst growling ferociously. Weiss hit the beast's tusk as she rolled off to the side before her and the beast were soon staring at one another.

"Haha, wasn't expecting that were you?"

'Hang in there Weiss!", Ruby shouted words of encouragement with a smile on her face as Weiss and the beast charged at each other. As Myrtenaster made contact with the Grimm's tusks, it quickly swung its head which caused the silver rapier to be caught between its tusks.

"Bold, new approach. I like it!"

"Come on Weiss, show it who's boss!", Weiss looked at Ruby for a second before the Boarbatusk reared back causing her weapon to flung across the room as it rammed into her, throwing her to the ground as Professor Port let out a hearty chuckle.

"Now what will you do without your weapon?", the beast was charging at her with great speed as she barely manages to dodge its assault before she ran over to retrieve Myrtenaster.

"Weiss go for its belly. There's no armor underneath-", Ruby was quickly cut off by Weiss yelling at her.

"Stop telling me what to do!", with a dejected look on her face, Ruby went silent as the Grimm roared at Weiss before curling up into a ball and barreling at Weiss as she used a Glyph to deflect its oncoming attack which in turn caused it to be flipped onto its back as she flipped onto another Glyph that she had summoned in the air as she used it to launch herself at the beast, impaling it as then squirmed around a bit before dropping dead.

"Bravo! Bravo! It appears we are indeed in the presence of a true Huntress in training.", Weiss panted heavily as she sheathed her weapon before the Professor began to speak.

"I'm afraid that is all the time we have for today. Be sure to cover the assigned readings and, stay vigilant. Class dismissed," Weiss glared at Ruby with a burning rage as she walked out of the classroom.

"Sheesh, what's with her?", asked Jaune to no one in particular as team RWBY looked at one another.

* * *

Ruby turned a corner as she ran after Weiss.

"Weiss!", she cried as the white haired girl quickly turned to look at her.

"What?", she said in an irritated tone as before Ruby began to speak.

"What's wrong with you? Why are you being-"

"What's wrong with me? What's wrong with you? You're supposed to be a leader and all you've been so far is a nuisance," Ruby scoffed at her accusation.

"What did I do?", asked Ruby in a slightly confused tone.

'That's just it, you've done nothing to earn your position. Back in the forest, you acted like a child and you've only continued to do so," Weiss yelled at the girl with a harsh tone as she continued to question her.

"Weiss, where is this coming from? What happened to all the talk about, working together? I thought you believed in acting as a team?"

"Not a team led by you. I've studied, and trained, and quite frankly , I deserve better," Weiss turned her back to Ruby as she reached out.

"Ozpin made a mistake," Ruby let her arm fall as Weiss stormed off

* * *

 **"** **Oi!", Weiss turned around to see an oranged haired teen with his the collar of his uniform undone with a sloppily done tie.**

"What do you want? I-"

"Where do you get off treating a teammate like that?", Ichigo asked with a hint of anger in his voice.

"You saw that? What are you, a stalker?", Ichigo scowled at her.

"I didn't see anything but I did hear a certain white haired mega bitch yelling about how much a rotten, spoiled brat she is!", he yelled at her as she looked at him with rage in her eyes.

"How dare you! Don't you know who you'r-"

"I don't care! I honestly couldn't care any less about your social status or whatever!", Ichigo sighed before glaring at Weiss.

"Listen, You need to stop acting like that towards Ruby. She's just a kid and she's trying her best to be the best leader that she can," Weiss glared daggers at him as she spoke.

"That's my point! She is a child who has no right being a leader! She has done nothing to earn her position and is probably the worst person for Ozpin to pick as a team leader!", Ichigo raised a brow at her statement.

"Then explain why she would tell you that there is no armor under the stomach of a Boarbatusk? Correct me if I'm wrong, but shouldn't a good leader give advice to a struggling teammate so they don't get hurt in a dangerous situation like, I don't know, your fight with that Grimm?" Weiss stared at him as she made a futile attempt to respond.

"Nothing to say? Can't say I didn't expect that. Y'know, you've been calling her a child this entire despite her being younger than the rest of us. She's probably just excited about even being her let alone being a team leader; not to mention you've been a complete hypocrite."

"What are you babbling about now?", she asked in a snarky tone as Ichigo scoffed.

"The fact that you've been moaning and bitching for no reason, it's been a day since teams were assigned. Matter of fact you're probably you're probably just mad that things didn't go your way since you've probably were dying to be in charge of your team."

"Are you insinuating that I'm jealous of that dolt?", Weiss shouted with her fists clenched in rage as Ichigo rolled his eyes at her before turning to leave.

"I'm talking to you!", Ichigo stopped and looked over his shoulder.

"If you think Ozpin made a mistake, then why don't you go complain to one of the Professors instead of taking it out on a teammate," Weiss began to grit her teeth as he walked away.

"Don't worry, I will!"

* * *

It was around 6:45 P.m. and team RIOT were wrapping up with their little study session as the soft knock came from the door.

"I'll get it!", said Orihime as she sprang up to her feet and quickly opened the door. Behind the door stood Weiss with slight expression of guilt on her face.

"May I come in?", she asked in a low tone as Orihime blinked at her a few times.

"Of course come on in!", Weiss thanked her silently as she stepped into the dorm room whilst the other three members of the team stared at her.

"What do you want Ice Queen 2?", asked Ichigo in unenthusiastic tone.

"Why does everyo-", she stopped for a second, "Did you just say 'Ice Queen 2'?", she asked in extreme confusion.

"Well yea, people call you Ice Queen but the midget is already Ice Queen," Rukia rolled her eyes at the comment as Ichigo coughed.

"For different reasons though, anyways, what did you want?", Weiss took a breath before speaking.

"I ran to Professor Port on my way back and I told him about the whole problem I was having my team's leadership...he agreed with almost everything you said," Ichigo stared at her a bit as she spoke.

"And you're here why?", Weiss scoffed at his question.

"For advice of course!"

"Oh, alright. I'd suggest talking to Rukia about advice on being a better teammate. Her family is also loaded," she looked at him with a slight glare.

"You're pushing this on me?", Ichigo nodded.

"She's rich and snobby, so, I thought that the person that would be the most help is someone from a rich family who isn't a snob."

"I see your point and I'll do it," Rukia turned to Weiss and cleared her throat.

"Well, I'd suggest that you refrain from using your social status and or wealth to make yourself seem like you're better than anyone else. Next I'd say to not get mad just because something doesn't work out in your favor. Some things are out of your control, and I doubt that Ozpin is the type that you could bribe into letting you be the team leader," Weiss scoffed at the last remark but paid close attention to her words,

"Thank you for the advice. It was extremely informative," she turned to leave as Rukia started to speak again.

"One last thing, give things time in the future. Most great things won't happen overnight," Weiss nodded as she opened the door.

"I'll try to."

* * *

Weiss quietly entered her team's dorm, seeing her teammates were fast asleep she silently made her way over to Ruby; Weiss was shocked as she saw Ruby sprawled out on her bunk with books, papers, and an empty coffee mug scattered across the sheets. She gently shook Ruby, who flailed a bit as she woke.

"Weiss! I-I was studying and then I fell asleep, I'm sorry," Weiss put her hand over the girl's mouth and signaled her to be silent before looking back over at the coffee mug.

"How do you take your coffee?", she asked.

"Uh, I-I don't,"

"Answer the question."

"Uhh! Cream and five sugars!", Weiss sighed at her response.

"Don't move," she got down from the upper bunk soon after. A minute or so later she climbed back onto the top bunk with a filled mug.

"Here," she said as she held out the coffee mug to Ruby.

"Uhh, thanks Weiss," Weiss looked at the books once more before speaking.

"Ruby, I think you have what it takes to be a good leader. Just know, I'm going to be the best teammate you'll ever have," Ruby smiled at her as she spoke.

"Good luck studying," she climbed down from the top bunk before popping back up and pointing at one of the papers.

"That's wrong by the way," she climbed back down immediately after.

"Hey Ruby?"

"Uh-huh?", Ruby looked over at Weiss who was now standing at the door.

"I always wanted bunkbeds as a kid," she closed the door as Ruby went back to studying with a smile on her face."

* * *

 **AN:** **Chapter 5 complete! And this chapter is nearly 3000 words! That's honestly insane to me since most of my other chapters were much shorter. Anyway I hope you guys enjoyed the little confrontation between Weiss and Ichigo along with the rest of the chapter. See ya guys later!**


	6. The Secret

**The Secret**

* * *

Heavy panting came from the arena as Jaune hunched over his sword as he tried to catch his breath however Cardin WInchester seemed to be completely unscathed. He laughed at Jaune a bit as he muttered words of encouragement to himself; without warning Jaune pulled his sword from the ground and charged at his opponent, who simply side stepped to avoid his overhead strike before launching Jaune a few feet away with a simple swing of his mace however Jaune wouldn't let himself admit defeat. Without any warning, Jaune once again charged at Cardin this time putting all of his weight behind the strike. Crocea Mors collided against Cardin's mace causing a slight struggle but in the span of a few seconds Cardin managed to nearly overwhelm Jaune.

"This is the part where you lose," said Cardin as he further pressured Jaune.

"Over my dead bod-", Jaune's statement was cut short as Cardin delivered a sharp knee into his abdomen causing him to kneel over from the pain before Cardin went to deliver the final blow. A buzzer was heard as the lights turned on.

"Cardin, that's enough," Cardin looked back at Jaune, who was still on the floor, before walking away.

"Students, as you can see Mr. Arc's Aura has now dropped into the red in a tournament-style duel. This would indicated that Jaune is no longer fit for battle and that the official may call the match," Jaune struggled to get up as Glynda turned her head towards him.

"Mr. Arc, it's been weeks now, please try to refer to your scroll during combat gauging your Aura will help you to decide when it is appropriate to attack and or when it is better to move towards a more...defensive strategy," Jaune simply stared at his scroll and sighed as she began to speak again, "We wouldn't want you to be gobbled up by a Beowolf. now would we?"

"Speak for yourself", Cardin spoke in a bitter voice as he picked up his mace.

* * *

Team RIOT simply stood there as Cardin spoke these words, Rukia and Tatsuki were disgusted by Cardin's attitude while Orihime felt bad for Jaune however Ichigo was...in simple terms he was pissed, he hated people like Cardin with every fiber of his being.

"What an asshole!", Ichigo was fairly loud with his remark due to his rage causing quite a few people to hear him...including Glynda.

"What was that Mr. Kurosaki?", there was a bit of venom behind her words due to being interrupted by Ichigo's sudden outburst but he didn't even seem to care.

"I said that I want to fight Cardin," Glynda sighed as she gave him a stern look.

"We don't have the time for that tod-"

"C'mon let me fight him," she turned her head towards Cardin, I mean someone's gotta put carrot top in his place," she sighed heavily as she began to tinker on her tablet for a few seconds before a picture of Ichigo along with an Aura gauge replaced Jaune's.

"Alright you two have five minutes any longer than that and I will reprimand the both of you, do I make myself clear?", Cardin nodded as Ichigo spoke with a bitter tone.

"I'll make sure I'm done long before than."

* * *

Ichigo, now in his battle gear, walked towards the stage of the amphitheater as the students in the crowd made way for him. He drew Zangetsu from his back as he walked and with a deep scowl he muttered.

"Bankai," nearly everyone around him was shocked as black and red Aura covered the blade before revealing that it had morphed into a slightly smaller black katana; he hopped onto the stage and glared daggers at Cardin, who was currently waiting for Glynda to allow them to start the match.

"Begin," Cardin smirked as he heard these words, he beckoned for Ichigo to make the first move before resting his mace on his shoulder. Ichigo sighed as he glared more intensely at Cardin.

"You know," he spoke with a bitter tone behind his words, "I would just fight you as is but...you did quite a top notch job on royally pissed me off!", Ichigo proceeded to slightly crouch before bringing his hand to his face as Aura began to pour out from him. It took a moment but the black and red substance that inhabited the air but not a second ago was now nowhere to seen; Ichigo stood up as he removed his hand from his face revealed a mask that was eerily similar to that of bone like armor on a Grimm's body, from the bone like structure of it to the red markings that adorned it. While the mask alone was enough to send a shiver up Cardin's spine the most terrifying part however was Ichigo's eyes, the deep brown color was now replaced by a golden color surrounded by a black border.

" **What's wrong?"** , the double toned voice came across as mocking as Ichigo cracked his neck, " **If I didn't know better than I'd say you look scared Winchester. Well…"** , he darted at Cardin with his blade raised to strike.

" **You should be,"** the force behind the blow nearly brought Cardin to his knees, quickly breaking away from the small clash Ichigo delivered a horizontal strike to his jaw causing him to be thrown across the arena. He scurried to his feet as he saw the orange haired figure approaching before swinging his mace towards Ichigo,who effortlessly parried it before delivering a diagonal strike down his chest and then proceeding to strike him with a sharp left hook to his jaw followed by quick kick in his abdomen; Ichigo sighed as he watched Cardin attempt to catch his breath.

" **Wow, I didn't you to be such a let down. What happened to 'putting carrot top in his place'?"** , he shrugged as he grasped Tensa Zangetsu with a two hands , " **I guess it doesn't matter though. I'm ending this now,"** Ichigo rushed forward catching Cardin off guard as he proceeded striking him at least 10 times in row, the last one was particularly devastating. The well placed horizontal strike closed lined Cardin as he tried to hit Ichigo with an heavy overhead strike.

" **Getsuga Tensho,"** Ichigo's blade was quickly swarmed as black and red Aura manifested around it as he raised it above his head before striking down, releasing an enormous crescent of Aura that exploded upon contact with Cardin.

* * *

The lights came on soon after a buzzer announced Ichigo's victory, he turned away from Cardin as he went to walk off of the stage.

" **Here's a tip,"** Ichigo reached towards his face as the mask quickly dissipated in a few strands of Aura, "If you want to act like the strong can do whatever they please, then actually be strong," he spoke in a bitter tone as he removed himself from the stage as Glynda cleared her throat.

"Now then back to what I was going to say," she looked towards the mass of students in front of her as she spoke.

"Remember everyone! The Vytal Festival is only a few months away it won't be long before students from the other kingdoms start arriving in Vale, so keep practicing! Those who choose to compete in the combat tournament will be representing all of Vale," a bell went off signaling Ichigo to leave.

* * *

Ichigo was relaxing in the team's dorm as Rukia flung the door open as she shouted.

"What the hell was that?". Ichigo looked at her with a slightly confused look on his face as he went to speak but was instead was cut off by Rukia once more, "Don't even ask what I'm talking about! The mask Ichigo, what was with the mask?", the orange haired teen sighed before speaking.

"Do remember when I muttered about that girl being a Vizard?", Rukia looked around and Tatsuki and Orihime staring at her as he spoke.

"What the hell are you thinking? Ozpin told us not to say anything about that and you're just blurting it out in fro-"

"They already know Rukia," Ichigo spoke with a stern tone as Rukia glared at him intensely.

"You told them! Why the hell would you do such a thing?!", Orihime chimed in as soon as Rukia finished yelling.

"Because We already knew about Ichigo," Rukia stared at her with a dumbfounded expression on her face as Tatsuki began to speak.

"We've both known Ichigo since we were really young so when that ability manifested we were there with him," Ichigo stood up and sighed.

"Look, we were in the forest one day and we ran into an Ursa. We were around ten years old so I all I had at the time was a bokken and let me tell you that didn't work out too well for me. But after Tatsuki was also flung into a tree and Orihime was trying desperately to defend from that thing, I just kinda snapped out, according to them my eyes changed color and I had a quarter of a mask formed on my face when I killed it," he shooted a glance at Rukia, who currently wore a worried expression.

"If you're worried about me going berserk like that girl in the forest don't be. Ole' goat chin talked to Kisuke and he knew a group of people who were also Vizards and they helped me get my powers under control," Rukia smiled slightly.

"Well that's a relief," she said in a slightly cheerful tone before her smile was replaced by a serious expression once more.

"While we're on the subject. Do you have any idea why that girl was like that when we found her?", she stared at Ichigo with a curious expression on her face.

"She probably was starving or something," he sat back down on his bed before continuing.

"The group of Vizards explained it to me during training. A Vizard's power stems from our instincts as well as negative emotions, so as I was said before that girl was probably lost in the Emerald Forest, scared out of her mind on top of starving," he laid back on his bed and stared at the ceiling.

"Can we just stop talking about this? Everyone is probably going to be interrogating me about my bankai and the mask," Rukia looked at Tatsuki and Orihime, who just simply nodded at her, before she looked back over at Ichigo.

"Of course. We need our rest after all," she walked over to turn the lights off before laying down as her teammates fell asleep.

* * *

Being the center of attention was not his intention at all but with the little stunt he pulled yesterday what else did he expect? Being asked by Professor Port to stand in front of the entire class was certainly not one of those things; Ichigo groaned as he watched the eyes of the students glued themselves upon him as the Professor entered the room.

"Now, I'm sure some of you may be wondering why Mr. Kurosaki is standing in front of the class," he began in a hearty tone, "Well allow me to answer that question! Class we are in the presence of an extremely rare phenomenon… a Vizard!", the students began to murmur to one another before one of them decided to raise their hand.

"Excuse me Professor, but aren't Vizards just a myth?", Port chuckled at the student's inquiry.

"They were thought to be, however Mr. Kurosaki is living proof that they are very much real," he turned to Ichigo as he cleared his throat.

"Mr. Kurosaki if you would," Ichigo sighed as he brought his hand to his face, summoning the mask. The appearance of his mask caused another round of side discussions to emerge, however they only last for about a minute or so due to Professor Port speaking.

"Now before we go over the history of Vizards, does anyone have any questions for Ichigo?", Ruby's hand shot up like lightning at the mention of questions.

"Is it normal for your mask to change like that?", Ichigo tilted his head in confusion and beckoned for her to elaborate a bit.

"Like the red markings on it, they look like they got bigger," Ichigo shrugged as began to speak.

" **Yea, I'm pretty sure it's normal. I mean they started off as a few stray markings but eventually they developed into a pattern or something. Anything else?"** , Ruby shook her head as a few more students raised their hands causing Ichigo to sigh.

" **And what do you want to know?"**

* * *

"Class that is enough questions for now," Ichigo seemed a bit exhausted from the barrage of questions that he was currently recovering from.

' _They are way too curious,"_ Ichigo turned to Professor Port and pointed to his mask.

" **Can I take this off and go back to my seat now?"** , Port simply nodded as Ichigo simply walked back to his seat as he dematerialized the mask.

"Now, we will begin discussing the history of the Vizards. Most of you know the Vizards from legends and fairytales however we will not be talking about such things. No, today we will focus on the confirmed facts about the Vizards!", the professor kept his enthusiastic tone as he spoke **.**

' _This is going to be a long day isn't it?"_ , Ichigo simply let his head thump against the desk as he groaned.

* * *

"So, there we were in the middle of the night," Nora spoke in a suspenseful tone as she told a story...a story that Ren would be correcting constantly.

"It was day," said Ren in a bored tone.

"We were surrounded by Ursai."

"They were Beowolves,"

"Dozens of them!", shouted Nora as she nearly leaped from her seat.

"Two of 'em," Ren spoke in a tone they completely contrasted the excitement from Nora's voice.

"But they were no match and in the end...Ren and I took them down and made a boat load of Lien selling Ursa skin rugs!" Ren sighed as Nora said back down.

"She's been having this reoccurring dream for the nearly a month now," Pyrrah turned to Jaune who was picking at his food.

"Jaune...are you okay?", Jaune looked over at her slightly surprised as he was brought out of his daze.

"Huh. Oh, yeah why?", he said in a slightly worried tone as Ruby looked over at him.

"It's just that you seem a little...not okay..."

"Eh, guys, I'm fine...seriously look!", he nervously laughed as he spoke, they were cut off by a commotion going on a few tables away from them. Team CRDL was currently mocking a Faunus girl who was simply minding her own business.

"Jaune, Cardin's been picking on you since the first week of school," Jaune looked back at Pyrrah.

"Who? Cardin Winchester? Nah… he just likes to mess around, you know…practical jokes!", he said as he waved his hand dismissively before Ruby leaned in slightly.

"He's a bully," Ruby spoke in a low voice as Jaune nervously chuckled.

"Oh please...name one time he's 'bullied' me," the group went on to recall on times such as Cardin activating Jaune's shield so he'd get stuck in a doorway or when he pushed into a locker and launched away from the school.

"I didn't land far from the school…"

'Jaune you know if you ever need our help you can just ask," Pyrrah said in a concerned tone as Nora leapt up from her seat once more.

"OHH! We'll break his legs!", Nora exclaimed with a tad bit too much enthusiasm.

"Guys, really it's fine! Besides, it's not like he's only a jerk to me; he's a jerk to everyone," Jaune got up with his tray as the commotion grew louder.

"Oww, that hurts!", Cardin was now yanking the girl's rabbit ear whilst him and his team laughed.

"Please, stop…", she spoke in an irritated tone as Cardin pulled on her ear some more.

"I told you it was real!", Cardin spoke as he slowly stopped laughing.

"What a freak!', said Russel as they started to laugh once again.

* * *

"That's it, I'm done," Ichigo spoke in an aggravated tone as he stood from his seat and began to walk over towards the table; Cardin felt a tight grip on his wrist as he went to pull on the girl's ear again, turning his head, he saw a certain scowling orange haired teen. Ichigo drew his arm back before punching him in the jaw, knocking him from his seat before stomping his foot down on his chest.

"I thought I said this kind of behavior got under my skin, yet here you are trying to act tough. Boy, you must really want to embarrass you like I did back at the amphitheater," Cardin shook his head as Ichigo glared down.

"Good, now how about you go piss off!", Ichigo lifted his foot as Cardin got up and quickly walked away whilst beckoning for his team to follow.

"Umm, thank you," Ichigo turned around to see that the timid voice belonged to the Faunus girl causing him shrug before responding.

"You're welcome, guys like him just piss me off," Ichigo sighed and waved at the girl before walking back to his table.

"Well, have a nice day."

* * *

Ruby was trying to contain her excitement as Ichigo sat down...failing to do so.

"That was so cool!", Ruby nearly shouted right in his face, startling him a bit, right before she went on to list the reasons for her statement.

"You just walked up there and were like BAM! Just socked him right in the mouth!", Ichigo look extremely confused at her little speech as Yang laughed a bit before explaining.

"She thinks it was cool because you helped that girl and punched Cardin in the mouth,"

"Eh, it was nothing. As I said before I just don't like people like that," Orihime smiled a bit as he spoke.

"Ichigo has always been like that. When he sees someone in trouble, he helps them," she spoke in a cheerful voice as she reminisced about the past before Tatsuki decided to chime in.

"Most of the adults thought he was a delinquent though. Probably because he would get into a fight with a group of bullies every other week," Tatsuki started laughing as Ichigo scowled at her upon mention of his former reputation.

"By the way Ichigo, I've been meaning to ask but...how does your weapon work?", unsurprisingly Ruby decided to ask this question despite what was going on.

"Well, for starters, my semblance is offensive aura projection," Ichigo spoke as Ruby listened intently.

"Zangetsu has an aura conduit which reacts to my aura, allowing me to use my semblance more effectively, as well a voice recognition device which activates with a release command, in this case it's 'Bankai'. After the Aura conduit has my my Aura running through it and I say the release command, Zangetsu will transform into it's Bankai from, which I call Tensa Zangetsu, causing my semblance to be further amplify," Ruby squealed a bit after hearing his explanation causing him to simply stare at her.

"I don't know what you're getting all excited for, Rukia's weapon does something similar," Rukia glared at him as Ruby darted over to her.

"Rukia, please tell me!", Ruby was currently shaking Rukia by the shoulders.

"Fine, just please stop shaking me!"

"Sorry," Ruby stopped and chuckled a little before Rukia began.

"My Sode no Shirayuki is built using the same engineering as Ichigo's Zangetsu since they're both the same type of weapon," Ruby looked a bit confused as she said this.

"Let me explain. Now I'm not sure if you heard of the Shinigami faction before?", Ruby got a bit closer and stared at her.

"You mean the faction of hunters, who were nearly impossible to match on the battlefield?"

"Well yes...You see Ichigo and I both have family members who are Shinigami, so our weapons were forged by the same smiths from that faction. These weapons are called Zanpakutos, they are forged to amplify a person's semblance. They are forge in two different models, a Shikai model, which looks like a normal sword until it is released, and the one Ichigo has is the Bankai model, they are also in their Shikai form until the Bankai form is activated," Ruby was beaming at Rukia as she explained all of this.

"Is there any advantage of upgrading from a Shikai to a Banaki?", Ruby asked with a curious expression on her face.

"Of course! A Zanpakuto's Bankai is about 2x stronger overall and the amplification of your semblance increases by at least 39%," Ruby would then go on to tell Rukia all about her baby:Crescent Rose.

* * *

Jaune was fast asleep as Professor Oobleck zipped around the room giving a lecture on the history of faunus rights.

"Yes! Yes, prior to the Faunus Rights Revolution, more popularly known as the Faunus War, humankind was kind quite, quite adamant about centralizing Faunus population in Menagerie," he spoke extremely fast as he pointed to location on his map of the world before he proceeded to start zipping around the room at incredible speeds once more.

"Now! While this must feel like ancient history to most of you, it is imperative to remember that these are relatively recent events! Why the repercussions of the uprising can still be seen to this day!", he took a slight break to sip from his coffee cup.

"Now have any among you been subjugated or discriminated against due to your Faunus heritage?", a few students raised their hands before Velvet decided to raise her's, very reluctantly at that,

"Dreadful! Simply dreadful! Remember students, it is precisely this kind of ignorance that breeds violence! I mean, I mean just look at what happened to the White Fang! Now, which one you young scholars can tell me what many theorists believe to be the turning point in the third year of the war?", Weiss quickly raised her hand as the Professor called on her.

"The battle at Fort Castle!"

"Precisely! And, who can tell me the advantage the Faunus had over General Lagune's forces?", as he was speaking Cardin flicked a hornet at the back of Jaune's head causing him to awake.

"Hey!", Jaune blurted this out as he was rudely awoken causing Oobleck to zip over to him.

"Mr. Arc! Finally contributing to class. This is excellent! Excellent! What is the answer?"

"Uhh...the answer is…", Jaune had no clue what is was and looked around at teammates and friends, hoping for some sort of clue.

"The advantage...of the Faunus...had over that guy's stuff…", Pyrrah attempted to give him a clue by making a few gestures before finally cupping her hands around her eyes.

"Uhh, b-binoculars!", the students around him laughed a bit as Oobleck took another sip from his cup.

"Very funny, Mr. Arc. Cardin, perhaps you would care to share your thoughts on the subject!"

"Well, I know it's a lot easier to train an animal than a soldier," Cardin replied in a very condescending tone causing Pyrrah to speak up.

"You're not the most open-minded of individuals, are you Cardin?"

"What? You got a problem?", Cardin responded in a slightly irritated voice.

"No, I have the answer! It's night vision. Many Faunus are known to have nearly-perfect sights in the dark," Cardin groaned a bit as Pyrrah spoke before Blake followed up on Pyrrah's answer.

"General Lagune was inexperienced and made the mistake of trying to ambush the Faunus in their sleep. His massive army was outmatch and the General was captured. Perhaps if he had paid attention in class, he wouldn't have been remembered as such a failure," Cardin got up from his seat with a clenched fist as he heard Blake's snarky comment.

"Mr. Winchester! Please take your seat," Jaune started laughing at the sight of Cardin being scolded as Professor Oobleck dashed over towards him.

"You and Mr. Arc can both see me after for additional readings," Jaune groaned as he zipped away shouting.

"Now moving on!"

* * *

Ichigo and Orihime were walking along with some drinks in hand as they heard the sound of Jaune falling followed by Cardin laughing. Cardin's footsteps approached as they heard Pyrrah speak.

"You know, I really will break his legs," she said in a disdainful tone as the footsteps got closer to the two . As he turned the corner, Cardin went stark white as he saw a scowling Ichigo and Orihime with a disapproving look on her face; Without warning Ichigo delivered a sharp right hook to his jaw causing him to stumble back a few feet, he then walked past Cardin as Orihime smacked Cardin right across the face, sending him to the ground.

"Damn, has Tatsuki been having you work out with her?", Ichigo asked as Orihime catched up to him with a smirk on her face.

"Well, yea I figured it'd be good to train with her, After all it did help me get into Beacon," The two chuckled a bit as they walked towards their dorm room.

* * *

Upon arriving at their team's dorm, they were greeted by the sight of Rukia and Tatsuki being interrogated by two students.

"He's not here right now! Look I'll let you kn-... Oi Ichigo! You have visitors!", Rukia screamed upon seeing Ichigo and beckoned for him to keep over.

"Uhh, what's going on?", Ichigo asked with a deadpan expression on his face, as he said this a brown haired girl wearing sunglasses and an expensive looking outfit got close to him… a bit too close.

"So you're Ichigo Kurosaki?", Ichigo stared at the girl a few seconds before even attempting to reply.

"Uhh, yea...why?", the girl stuck her hand out, Ichigo reluctantly shook it as she spoke.

"I'm Coco and that's my teammate Yatsuhira," she gestured to the extremely tall guy behind wearing some green armor as he simply waved at Ichigo.

"I just wanted to thank you helping out Velvet. She's really timid and refused to tell us anything about it," Ichigo chuckled lightly as he realized that the two weren't here to pick a fight with him.

"Oh, that! Look it's no problem, you really don't even have to thank me for that," Coco shook her head.

"Even so, I just wanted to express our gratitude."

"Oh, uh, no problem. Now if you'll excuse me I have to go into my dorm now," he walked by the two and entered the dorm.

"Have a nice night," he said before closing the door and handing out the drinks he and Orihime purchased for the others.

"Anyone else get a Chad vibe from that big guy?", Ichigo asked in a curious tone, his teammates quickly agreed with him before Tatsuki decided to ask everyone a question.

"Putting that aside. Do you guys think Jaune's alright now?", Rukia was the first to answer.

"I honestly don't know. I hope he is though...no one should have to be treated like that," team RIOT unanimously agreed on Rukia's point; Ichigo looked around the room.

"Anyone up for a movie or something?", Rukia shrugged.

"That sounds good right about now," Tatsuki and Orihime quickly agreed with her.

"You and Rukia have to go get the snacks and drinks this time. Ichigo and I went last time," the two groaned a bit before leaving the dorm, announcing on their way out that they would be about ten minutes.

* * *

 **AN:** **Six chapters in and I finally disclosed on how the Shikai and Bankai works in this story (as well as Zanpakutos in general). The Vizard scenes were honestly pretty fun to write if I'm being honest here. One more thing though I'm going to put up a poll asking if you guys think it would be a good idea to introduce an encyclopedia side story, so I may better explain things such as the Vizards, Shinigamis or even the Zanpakuto. The poll will also be asking if you would like to see "trailers" for team RIOT, similar to the RWBY trailers they would give insight to what the members were doing before they came to Beacon. Now, hope you guys enjoyed this chapter, 'till next time.(Edit: I forgot to mention the poll is located at my profile so if you wish to vote just visit my page)**


	7. Red Falls At The Rising Hero's Feet

**Red Falls At The Rising Hero's Feet**

* * *

The cool air was rather refreshing as Rukia and Orihime walked back towards the dorms, they were completely exhausted and wanted nothing more than to rest. The source of this fatigue came Tatsuki, who suggested that the entire team should train for a few hours...the problem was the training was grueling. Ichigo and Tatsuki had no problem with any of the exercises, from sparring to lifting weights, this training regiment had it all; the two had suggested Rukia and Orihime take break before meeting up with them near the dorms which they immediately agreed to.

"Th-this is insane", Rukia groaned as she walked back as Orihime slightly lagged behind.

"I knew Tatsuki could be bad with the training but both of them are a nightmare!", Rukia nodded in agreement to Orihime's statement; while it was true that she was used to training, Rukia wasn't quite used to this level. Most of her experiences comes from stretches, running, and combat practice, she wasn't too keen on the idea of lifting, and when the time came for her to actually do it...it destroyed any form of energy she had left, matter of fact she could still feel the burning and aches in her muscles.

"Hey, isn't that Jaune?", Rukia looked at the oranged haired girl before focusing on the figure a few feet away.

"Now that you mention it…", she squinted her eyes as she attempted to observe every detail of the person ahead of them and the bill matched Jaune perfectly. They sped up a bit as they walked towards him.

"Jaune!", the blond quickly looked behind before speaking.

"Oh, hey guys," his voice seem to have a sense of dread in it causing the pair to become curious.

"Are you feeling alright?", Rukia asked with a neutral expression on her face as Orihime began to speak.

"You know if something's bothering you, you can tell us," Jaune shook his head as they continued walking.

"I'm fine, really I am," the pair looked at each other before looking back at him with a look of doubt of their face,

"If you say so Jaune, Just so you know, you look like hell right now," Jaune chuckled at Rukia's remark.

"I guess I need to hit the hay then."

* * *

"They're taking a bit longer than they should be don't you think?", Ichigo turned to Tatsuki and shrugged.

"I guess, but I mean they aren't really used to this kind of training," he leaned back against a wall as he started to speak.

"If I had to guess though, I'd say those two are probably just taking it slow...today had to be a bit rough on them," Tatsuki crossed her arms and sighed deeply as she looked forward before something quickly caught her eye.

"I think I see them," Ichigo raised a brow at her before turning to what she was looking at.

"Yep, that's them and…", he squinted at the other person in attempt to make out their identity.

"Oh wow, looks like Jaune is with them," Ichigo stood up straight and started walking forward. He beckoned Tatsuki to follow as he started to walk faster.

"Yo!". Ichigo was jogging towards the trio with Tatsuki not too far behind.

"Oh, hey Ichigo," surprisingly, Jaune was the first one to react to the greeting.

"Long time no see man," Ichigo cracked a small smile as he patted Jaune on the shoulder, prompting a slight response from Jaune.

"Yea, it's been a while…", the blond had a slight smile on his face as he spoke; as Tatsuki joined the conversation she wore an expression of slight concern on her face as she looked at Jaune.

"You okay Jaune? You look like you had a rough day," Jaune shrugged.

"Long day I guess," he looked around at the four before chuckling a bit, "You guys run a marathon or something?", Rukia pointed at Tatsuki and Ichigo as she started to shout.

"I swear these two are trying to kill us! You should have seen the massive weight he made me lift up!", Ichigo rolled his eye as her exaggeration of today's training.

"Rukia, calm down. It was 105 lbs."

"I refuse to believe that's how much it was! It had to be at least 200!"

"I was spotting you, I know what I put on the bar."

"You must be blind then!", Ichigo scoffed at her remark before wrapping his arm around her shoulders and giving her noogie.

"You tryin' to piss me off ya midget!", Rukia started to kick and flaw as Tatsuki turned to Jaune.

"She's in denial because Hime did 110 and she couldn't," Orihime giggled a bit as Tatsuki mentioned.

"Well, it's only because Tatsuki had me training with her before we came here," Tatsuki lightly punched her in the arm causing her to rub her arm due to slight pain.

"You gotta give yourself more credit Hime! You're stronger than you think," Tatsuki's little pep talk was cut short as Rukia elbowed Ichigo in the stomach before putting her fists up.

"You wanna go carrot top!", Ichigo brought his hands up into boxing stance with a scowl on his face.

"Bring on you midget!", before they could get any further Orihime and Tatsuki restrained the two. Orihime stood in front of Rukia and had her hands on her shoulders, gently pushing her back while Tatsuki...she looked like she was trying to tackle Ichigo to the ground, due to him being much larger than she was, Tatsuki had to hold him in place as he tried to push her back. The little squabble was interrupted by Jaune, he began to laugh hysterically to point where he was on the verge of crying. As he began to stop laughing, he pointed to Ichigo and Rukia.

"You guys look like me and my younger sisters!", he began to laugh again as Ichigo scoffed.

"Yea, well Ol' Goat Chin said she was like a third daughter," he glared at Rukia slightly.

"Though I don't remember ever getting into a fist fight with Karin or Yuzu," Rukia stuck her tongue out mockingly at Ichigo as he rolled his eyes.

"Thank you for that. Honestly, that made my night," Jaune waved and walked past them.

"Have a nice night," he called out to them in a cheerful tone as the four just stood still for a few seconds in utter silence.

"Ichigo and I got drinks by the way. They're over in that bag," Tatsuki pointed to a large plastic bag resting against a wall.

"Why didn't you say anything! I'm dying over here," Rukia darted straight towards the bag and quickly pulled out a bottle of water before downing it within a few seconds.

* * *

Team RIOT had just recently gotten settled in for the night, Rukia decided to speak up after a few moments of silence had passed.

"Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't Jaune's team say something about him being distant?", Tatsuki looked over and nodded at her.

"Yea, I remember Pyrrah saying something about that," Ichigo glances over at the two before deciding to chime in.

"I didn't know you hang out with Pyrrah."

"Well yeah, we hung out a few times but I mostly talk to her when I go to train," Tatsuki turned herself towards Ichigo and stared at him a bit.

"Um, do I have something on my face?", Tatsuki shakes her head.

"I was just wondering, you said your dad referred to Rukia as his third daughter," her expression quickly changes to one of curiosity, "So, care to explain?"

"Well, she came to Karakura Town a few months before school and then I ran into her...she kinda followed me back home and Goat Chin told she could stay at our place as long she needs," Tatsuki tilted her head slightly.

"But last time I came over the guest room was empty...whe-", before she could even ask, Orihime blurted out the answer to her unfinished question.

"Oh, she was living in Ichigo's closet!", Ichigo brought his hand to his face and just shook his head a bit as Tatsuki glared at him.

"She just went and set herself up in my closet," Tatsuki's gaze snapped over to Rukia for confirmation.

"Well, yea I did...I would've took the guest room if I knew about though," Ichigo glared at her.

"I tried to tell you about it but you just went into my closet and unpacked!"

"You went straight to your room! I thought you were going to show me where the guest room was!"

"I ran into you on my way back from the store...I was going to show you to the room after I put the stuff I bought away!", Rukia rolled her eyes and put on a teasing smirk.

"I bet you just wanted to keep a cute girl in your room didn't you?", she spoke in a seductive tone...but it was cut short by Ichigo's small fit of rage.

"Can you shut the hell up!", he shouted at her before throwing large book at her.

"Oi! That could have hitted me you fool!", Ichigo rolled his eyes at her remark.

"That was the point!", Orihime quietly giggled at the two before turning to Tatsuki.

"Just like home isn't it?", Tatsuki smiled a bit and nodded.

"Yea, a home away from home."

* * *

The first year students followed behind Professor Goodwitch as they all stared at the scenery around them. The leaves that decorated the trees and the forest floor were a brilliant shade of red as they continued to drift through the air. It was like a painting, it just seemed impossible for such a beautiful place to exist.

"Yes students, the Forest of Forever Fall is indeed beautiful. But we are not here to sightsee. Professor Peaches asked all of you to collect samples from the trees deep inside this forest. And I'm here to make sure that none of you will die while doing so," the class comes to halt causing Jaune to bump into Cardin, who shot him an irritated glare, whilst he was carrying a case with multiple jars on top of it.

"Each of you is to gather one jar's worth of red sap. However, this forest is full of the creatures of Grimm, so be sure to stay by your teammates. We will rendezvous back here at four o'clock. Have fun!", as she finished talking, Jaune went to walk towards his team only to be pulled over by Cardin.

"C'mon, buddy! Let's go," Jaune looked at Pyrrah with a troubled expression before going with Cardin causing her to let out a sigh.

* * *

Team RIOT was gathered around a section of trees with teams RWBY and JNPR, filling up jars with sap. Orihime stuck her finger in the red substance and tasted it before letting out a slight squeal delight. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a small container and began to fill it up. Ichigo noticed her actions and walked over towards her as he finished filling up his jar.

"Hey Orihime," she recoiled at the sound of his voice and turned around to face.

"Y-yes Ichigo?"

"Do me a favor, if you planning on taking some of that stuff for yourself, could you please get some for me? I want to give to my mom and Yuzu so they could make something with it," Orihime smiled brightly at him as his cheeks revealed a slight pink hue as he mentioned his mother and sister.

"Of course! After all it's nice of you to think of your family like that."

"Thanks Orihime, I appreciate it.", she smiled at him again before going back to what she was doing; a few minutes passed as a roar echoed throughout the forest. Ruby looked up before turning to the others with a worried look on her face.

"Did you guys hear that?", not a second later, the members of Cardin's team came rushing from the opposite direction. Russell began yelling as he ran.

"Ursa! Ursa!", Yang stopped his dash and lifted him up by his collar.

"What! Where?", she asked as he pointed behind him.

"Back there! It's got Cardin!", Pyrrah dropped the jar of sap she was holding as she heard this,

"Jaune!", she exclaimed in a worried tone, Ruby looked at her before looking at her teammates.

"Yang! You and Blake go get Professor Goodwitch," Pyrrah turned to the Ichigo's team and her remaining teammates.

"You two go with them! There could be more," Ren and Nora darted at her command, Rukia wasn't far behind them as the rest of her team soon followed .

* * *

"Things just keep getting better and better don't they!", Ichigo shouted as he ran. Yang laughed a bit before responding to his sarcasm.

"Yea, I know right!", Rukia and Blake both rolled their eyes at the two's optimistic joking before Tatsuki decided to put an end to it.

"Guys, can you stop joking around? This is serious!", Ichigo scoffed at her comment and Yang went on to reply.

"What? It's not like things can get any worse," Orihime gasped as the words left Yang's mouth.

"Yang! You shouldn't say things like that!", she shouted with a sense of urgency in her voice. Yang chuckled at her concern as she continued to run.

"Yea? What are eight more gonna show up?", the rustling in the forest indicated that Yang had just screwed the pooch and Orihime's superstition proved true as eight large Ursai emerged from all sides.

"See! This is why you don't say things like that!", Orihime scolded Yang for being a smartass and jinxing the whole situation.

"You got lucky!"

"Guys!", Ren yelled at the two causing the pair to become silent before turning to face the oncoming enemies.

"We have much bigger problems than your little argument here!", Yang pointed a finger at Orihime.

"This isn't over!", she then quickly went to Blake's side before darting at an Ursa and delivering a heavy haymaker to its rib cage.

"Dance! Sode no Shirayuki," Rukia issued to her blade's release command causing it to shift into its Shikai state; An Ursa lunged at her but was quickly countered by Orihime.

"Shiten Koshun, I reject!", she slide her fingers across her hairpin before aiming behind Rukia's back. The golden, triangular shield appeared behind her and caused the beast to be thrown a few feet back; it roared at Orihime and began to charge. Tatsuki leaped at the Grimm and narrowed her eyes as she drew her weapon, the weapon took the shape of a bo staff as the world around her lost color due to her semblance. The Ursa's knee glew slightly as it stood to strike, she spun the steel staff around before smashing it into its knee, sweeping it onto the ground. Tatsuki hit a switch on the weapon causing it to split into a pair of wakizashi blades as the Ursa stood back and charged at her. She readied herself as the beast rushed at her, she activates her semblance once again, this time she sees two thin lines of color leading to the Grimm's chest and lower stomach, once in position she strikes. With a swift motion she draws the two blades through the Ursa's body and flips herself behind before looking at Orihime.

"Hime now!", Orihime pulled reached behind and pulled out a high caliber assault rifle and began to fire at the Grimm, killing it within 14 shots.

* * *

Yang and Blake were caught up in their own little scrap with a rather large Ursa, as it swung, Blake used her Gambol and Shroud to slice to through its legs and and arms as Yang provided supporting fire using her Ember Celica before Blake finished her assault and perched herself on a tree branch, giving Yang a thumbs up as the Ursa fell to its knees. The blonde charged at the Grimm and delivered a skull shattering uppercut.

"Well, that wasn't too bad," out of the bushes come two more Ursai, bigger than the last. Blake looked at her partner.

"You really need to learn to be quiet every once in awhile," Yang shrugged as she ducked a strike from the larger of the two beasts before punching it in the jaw. The second one attempted to get the jump on her soon after, however Blake intercepted the creature by placing a deep gash in its chest. The two beasts roared at them before Yang looked at Blake.

"Y'know these Ursai are really 'heating' me up," Blake groaned as Yang activated her semblance and smirked before charging at the smaller Grimm.

* * *

Ren jumped over the Ursa's attack, using this opportunity, he began to fire at the beast before dragging StormFlower's blades down its mid-section before flipping back a few feet. He looked at Nora and nodded as she gripped Magnhild tightly. The energetic girl smashed the hammer into the Ursa's knee before smashing its head into the ground before striking a victory pose as Ren wiped the sweat from his forehead.

"That should be the last of them," he looked at Nora, who was currently beaming with excitement, "Come on Nora, we have to go find the others."

"Okay!", she responded in a cheery tone as she stood still humming a happy tone.

"Nora!", Ren shouted impatiently.

"Coming!", as she said this, she began to skip towards Ren with Magnhild resting on her shoulder.

* * *

"I still can't believe we let ourselves get separated like that!", Rukia exclaimed in a frustrated voice as her and Ichigo walked through the forest.

"I just hope they're okay," Ichigo rested Tensa Zangetsu on his shoulder as he searched for signs of the others.

"Ichigo, look over there!", he turned his head towards where Rukia was pointing. Up ahead, Professor Goodwitch was standing with the rest of their team along with the stray members from teams RWBY and JPNR. They began to run towards the group as they noticed them.

"Ichigo! Rukia!", Orihime exclaimed before her and Tatsuki embraced the two. Tatsuki broke away from the little group hug a few moments later and looked at Ichigo and Rukia with a worried expression on her face.

"Are you guys alright?"

"Yea, just a few scratches and bruises is all," Orihime darted towards them.

"Let me heal you then," Ichigo waved his hand dismissively.

"It's fine, really nothing too …", Ichigo grabbed Orihime by the shoulders and looked her straight in the eyes, "You really should save your energy. We're fine alright?", she nodded at him.

"Okay," Glynda cleared her throat as she looked at the group of students before her.

"Alright, we need to search for the rest of your class. This forest is incredibly dangerous and we need to stick together for this," she looked around at the first year students with an intense gaze.

"Understand?", the students nod in confirmation, "Good, now in which direction did the rest of your classmates go?

"They went that way ma'am," Blake pointed forward.

"Alright, let's get moving," As Glynda began to walk, about five more Ursai began to rush from behind the group. Ichigo groaned as he saw the creatures.

"I've had it up to here with these bastards! Why do they keep popping up?"

"Umm, Ichigo...I got some of that sap in my hair," he turned towards Orihime who was currently trying separate some hair that was sticking together due to a certain red substance.

"Okay, I'm done with this," he raised his hand to his summoning his Vizard mask.

"Mr. Kurosaki, what do you think you're doing?"

" **Blowing these bastards to high hell!"** , he gripped Tensa Zangetsu tightly with two hands as Aura began to erupt from the blade.

"Stop this instant! Do you have an-", her sentence was cut short as Ichigo raised the blade over his head and brought it down with straight over head slash.

" **Getsuga Tensho!"** , the giant black and red crescent made contact with one of the Ursai and exploded into a giant wave of Aura that began to flood through the forest.

* * *

Jaune, Pyrrah, Ruby, and Weiss were walking back towards where they were initially gathering the red sap; upon arrival they saw a rather peculiar scene. Glynda was screaming at Ichigo, who was currently sitting on the ground with a scowl on his face.

"I hope you release how reckless your actions were!", Ruby thought back to the moment she met Ozpin and Glynda as she heard these words. Curiosity grew in the four as they walked to the group.

"Excuse me, Professor Goodwitch...what happened?", she turned to Weiss with an irritated expression on her face.

"Well Ms. Schnee, Ichigo here thought it would be a good idea to dispose of a few Ursai…"

"That doesn't sound like a reason to disci-"

"By blowing an entire section of the forest to pieces," she pointed to the section of trees that were toppled over and torn apart.

"Oh…", Weiss looked over to Ichigo and back to Glynda, who had just turned towards the oranged haired boy.

"As I was saying, you must think before you act Mr. Kurosaki. What if that blast had happened closer to the group?", Ichigo rolled his eyes before looking her right in the face.

"Yea, yea, I won't use my mask unless I absolutely need to," he spoke in an extremely sarcastic tone, which annoyed Professor Goodwitch to no end.

"Do not take that tone of voice when addressing me," she turned and walked away from him as Ruby walked over and sat beside.

"You're really not use that mask unless it's an emergency?"

"Of course not! It's my mask, I'll use it when I feel like it," Ruby chuckled at his response.

"Good thing too, it makes you pretty mysterious in a sexy way," a seductive voice whispered in his ear, causing him to jump back a bit. Yang started to laugh as she saw his face turn red.

"You're way too much fun to mess with, strawberry!"

"Strawberry? Where did you hear that from?", Yang pointed to Tatsuki and Rukia, who had extremely smug expressions at the moment.

"Those two…", he turned back to Yang and stood up, "My name actually means 'number one protector', thank you very much," Yang smirked and grabbed his arm before pushing her breasts up against his chest.

"Even better, I would prefer not to be screaming Strawberry tonight," Ruby walked behind her and smacked her in the back of the head.

"Yang! Stop saying all that dirty stuff!", Yang pouted as she walked away.

"Thanks, Ruby. I didn't know how I was going to handle that."

"Oh, don't worry if she ever starts acting up just let me know," she wore a prideful smirk as she spoke.

"I will," Ichigo said as he looked over to make sure Yang wasn't creeping up on him again.

"Alright, I'm going to head over with my team now. See ya.", He turned and began to walk over to the two perpetrators that told Yang to call him "Strawberry".

' _I'm going to kill those two.'_

* * *

"You should have seen your face though!" Rukia and Tatsuki were rolling on the floor of the dorm nearly in tears from how hard they were laughing.

"It isn't funny!", Ichigo shouted at the two with a furious tone as they continued to laugh.

"No it's hilarious!", shouted Tatsuki as she continued to laugh.

"Shut up! I even told what my name actually meant and then she said something about how she likes that even better because she didn't want to be screaming Strawberry," Orihime's face went beet red as she heard this and then covered her face as she attempted not to let imagination go wild as the pair continued to laugh. Ichigo gritted his teeth and put his hand on his face.

" **Stop enabling that damn pervert!"** , his shouting caused them to stop as soon as they heard the familiar double toned voice. Ichigo glared at them before speaking again.

" **Now, I don't wanna hear another word of this. Got it?"** , the two nodded, " **Good,"** he turned around and flopped onto his before dismissing the mask.

* * *

 **AN:** **Alright, alright seven chapters in now. Now I hope that you guys aren't disappointed with Tatsuki and Orihime's weapons, with Tatsuki's weapon being a steel bo staff that is cable of shifting into other weapons used in martial arts and Orihime having...a gun. The reason behind Tatsuki's weapon choice is probably obvious but Orihime having an assault rifle is probably something that you wouldn't expect; the reasoning behind the weapon choice for Orihime is simple: I feel that Orihime would be someone who would either support others in combat or engage in combat from a range. I apologize for this chapter being shorter than the last…on a different note, thank you guys for all support so far and I hope you will continue to read. Until next time!**


	8. Stay Together

( Edit:10/4/16: So, someone pointed out how OP Orihime's healing ability would be and I wanted to address this immediately, so I will fix my description of her semblance in the Author's Note at the bottom of the chapter. Her healing factor will be toned down a lot compared to the actual manga or show. And I am sorry for not explaining this better, I'll try my best to make sure something like this doesn't happen again.)

* * *

Stay Together

* * *

"Wow, they're really going all out with this," Ichigo looked around at the city, decorations and banners were everywhere. The somewhat bleak street were now blooming with life and activity as the citizens prepared for the upcoming Vytal Festival.

"Well of course they are. The Vytal Festival is the largest event in the entire kingdom of Vale," Rukia explained the subject as if she were an expert, like Ichigo, Orihime was currently mesmerized by the amount of preparation put into the festival. Tatsuki looked at her teammates and sighed.

"Shouldn't we go and size up the competition?"

"Actually, that is a great idea," Ichigo and Orihime nodded at Rukia's approval of the proposed plan.

"So, where to?", Rukia looked at Ichigo with a bewildered expression on her.

"What do you mean 'where to'? The docks Ichigo! Geez, you act like you've never been to the Vytal Festival before…", the short girl took a step back as Ichigo looked at her with a confused expression.

"Don't tell me…", the orange haired boy nodded causing her to gasp. "How haven't you gone to the Vytal Festival?!"

"Well to be fair, none of us have," Orihime spoke up causing Rukia to gasp once again...and even louder than before.

"Yea, you don't really get to go these big city events when you live in a small town by the mountains," said Tatsuki, Rukia nearly screamed as they started to walk to the docks.

"And none of you ever wanted to go?", Ichigo shrugged as they walked.

"Believe me, all of us wanted to, but we were busy with combat school so, none of us really cared all that much," Ichigo started to look at the well decorated city once more.

"I gotta say though, This is a lot more than I was expecting," as they continued to walk, they noticed some familiar faces darted past them.

"Was that Ruby's team?"

"I think so," Ichigo looked over his shoulder at Tatsuki.

"Wanna go see why they're in such a rush?"

"I guess, I mean it must be something important.:

"Alright, let's go then!", Ichigo turned on his heels and began to sprint in the opposite direction as he was soon followed by the rest of his team.

* * *

"Salutations!", Ichigo turned the corner and stopped as he saw team RWBY hundled around something...well, from the looks of it, someone. The members of the team simply looked at the girl on the ground with a confused expression on their face.

"Um, hello."

"Are you...okay?"

"I'm wonderful. Thank you for asking," Ichigo just stood behind the four girls as his team quickly caught up with.

"Ichigo! What's going o-", Tatsuki stopped and stared at the scene that was unfolding in front of her. Ruby looked back and awkwardly waved as the rest of team RIOT arrived before turning back around.

"Ichigo what is happening?", Rukia leaned over and whispered as Ichigo just stared.

"Um, I, uh, I have no idea," it was at this time that Yang chimed in on her team's conversation with the strange girl.

"Do you ...wanna get up?"

"Yes," the mystery girl flipped herself back onto her feet causing the two teams to back up a bit. Ichigo whispered to his teammates with a puzzled look on his face.

"Should I be worried or impressed here?", they all just shrugged and turned back to the girl.

"My name is Penny! It's a pleasure to meet you!", the uncomfortable air got thicker as Penny randomly decided to introduce herself.

"Hi Penny. I'm Ruby."

"I'm Weiss."

"Blake."

"Are you sure you didn't hit your head?", Blake quickly hit Yang for the comment.

"Oh, I'm Yang," Penny looked behind the group and waved at Ichigo and his team. Ichigo awkwardly waved back.

"Uh, hi, I'm Ichigo."

"I am Rukia."

"Tatsuki."

"Hey Penny! I'm Orihime, it's nice to meet you!", Tatsuki sighed at her friend's overly bubbly personality.

"It's a pleasure to meet you!", Weiss looked at her suspiciously.

"You already said that."

"So I did!"

"Well, sorry for running into you."

"Take care friend!", Ruby waved at the girl as everyone began to walk away.

"Okay, that was odd," Ichigo blurted this out as they walked down the street, Yang nodded in agreement.

"She was weird…", Weiss paid no mind to these comments and set her eyes on her current goal.

"Now. Where did that Faunus riffraff run off to?", the group suddenly stopped.

"What did you call me?", it was Penny, how she got ahead of them so fast was currently one of the many questions running through their minds at the moment. Weiss pointed to Yang and began to quickly look behind the group and back at Penny.

"Oh, I'm really sorry, I definitely didn't think you hear me."

"No, not you…", Penny walked past Weiss and Yang before pointing at Ruby, "You!"

"Me?!", Ruby began to nervously stumble with her words due to the sudden amount of pressure placed on her.

"I-I don't know, I-what I-uh,uh"

"You called me 'friend'. Am I really your friend?"

"Ummmmmm", Ruby looked back at the group, who were all signaling her to say 'no'.

"Ya, sure! Why not?", everyone had a horrified look on their face as they fell over, Penny smiled brightly before laughing cheerfully.

"Sensational!", she then looked Ruby right in the eyes, "We can paint our nails, and try on clothes, and talk about cute boys!", Ruby leaned over to Weiss, who was currently getting back up, and groaned.

"Is this what it was like when you met me?"

"No, she seems 'far' more coordinated"

"So," Yang decided to speak up, "What are you doing in Vale?", Penny looked over at here with a straight face.

"I'm here to fight in the tournament."

"Wait, you're fighting in the tournament?"

"I'm combat ready!", Penny turned to Weiss and gave a quick salute.

"Yea, we're going to go...Later!", Ichigo waved before sprinting away, Weiss turned to Rukia.

"You guys aren't going to leave,,,right?", Rukia smiled nervously as Tatsuki took off.

"Sorry but...we have errands! Yes, we have errands to run!", Rukia grabbed Orihime by the arm and began to run.

* * *

"I did not have the willpower to stay there any longer! What is with that girl?!", Ichigo was currently shouting at the top of his lungs due to the recent events involving Penny.

"I thought she was kind of cool!", Orihime said with her tone indicating she was in high spirits, Tatsuki patted her on the back on sighed.

"Of course you did 'Hime," she smiled as Tatsuki said this, Ichigo looked over at Tatsuki and tilted his head.

"So what are we gonna do?", Tatsuki grinned as Ichigo asked this question.

"Well," she stepped forward and placed herself beside Ichigo, "Judging from that little sprint we just did, I think we need a bit more training!", Orihime and Rukia wore gloomy expressions as she said these words. Their expressions got even darker as Ichigo started to nod in agreement.

"Yea, I mean we could just hang out in the city tomorrow."

"Or! We could just stick with our initial plans! Come on Tatsuki didn't you want to go see the competition?", Rukia began to plead with the two but they simply just grinned and laughed a bit.

* * *

"Ugh, my everything," Rukia groaned as they walked down the busy city streets.

"Stop complaining it wasn't that bad," she sent a glare at Ichigo, who just rolled his eyes at her. Orihime looked over at Rukia and smiled.

"Come on Rukia, it was actually kind of fun! Exhausting but fun."

"You call that fun? I'm scared to know what else you think is 'fun'," Ichigo started laugh a little.

"You really should tune the sass down to about zero. Seriously, you're like an angry kid that got dragged to the store."

"Oh you can shut it Carrot Top," she pointed at Tatsuki, "You two are actually trying to kill me with these sessions aren't you?!", the accused pair stared at her for a few seconds before they busted out laughing.

"I'm being serious here!", Tatsuki and Ichigo were rolling on the ground laughing, Orihime began to snicker...it didn't take long for her to join in the pair.

"Oh man that's rich," Ichigo got up, wiping away a tear in his eye. As Tatsuki and Orihime got up, a slight beeping sound could be heard. The team stood there for a moment before realizing that the noise had come from their scrolls, they then swiftly pulled them out only to see a message from team RWBY.

"Blake's missing…", Orihime spoke out in slight shock as she read the message.

"She has to have a good reason for disappearing on them like that," Rukia had some bitterness in her voice as she spoke.

"I'll kick her ass next time I see her!", Orihime looked at Tatsuki with a look of worry on her face.

"Tatsuki, she's our friend…", Ichigo stepped forward as he put his scroll back in his pocket.

"Orihime's right, we need to be more understanding and find out about her situation," Tatsuki sighed and looked at the ground.

"Yea, sorry I just got a little heated," Rukia stepped forward with a determined look on her face.

"Alright, let's go find her then."

* * *

A few hours had passed by now, team RIOT went all over the city in an attempt to help team RWBY find Blake, unfortunately with little to no progress, until they asked an old shopkeeper

"Find anything yet?", Rukia looked up at Ichigo as he exited the store.

"Yea, according to the old man, she, or at least someone who matched my description of her, was with a blond guy with a monkey tail"

"Any other noticeable traits?", Ichigo scratched his head as he thought of the old man's words.

"Yea, he's a bit shorter than me, tan, and he was apparently wearing an unbuttoned shirt," Tatsuki sighed.

"Well at least we have some sort of lead now," Orihime nodded.

"It's pretty specific, so we just have to keep an eye out for someone who matches that description.", her teammates nodded in agreement as a slight rumbling could be heard. Orihime's face goes a bit red as she covers her stomach.

"I guess all this searching made me a bit hungry…", Rukia went to say something but was interrupted by ichigo.

"Well, I could go for a bite to eat... "

"How could either of you think about food at a time like this?!", Tatsuki came up and slapped Rukia on the back as she walked over to Ichigo and Orihime.

"We've been at this for hours, we gotta eat sometime don't we?"

"I-uh, We-uh…", Rukia stopped talking and pouted as the group began to drag her by arm.

"So, what do you guys want?"

"I dunno," Tatsuki turned to Orihime, "'Hime you have anything in mind?"

"Well, when we were searching, I saw this burger place that looked pretty good…"

"Alright, Orihime lead the way!", she had no time to react as Tatsuki and Ichigo positioned her to lead the team to the place she was talking about.

* * *

"Ahh, that hit the spot!", Ichigo wiped his mouth with a napkin as he finished his meal.

"Seriously we need to let you pick where we're going more often!" Tatsuki patted Orihime on the back.

"Really, it's nothing. I just thought a burger would've been good right about now."

"Well you're definitely right about that!", Rukia shouted a bit as she went back to devouring her burger.

"Wow, I thought we shouldn't have been thinking about food," Tatsuki leaned over the table with a smug face as Rukia glared at her.

"Shut up," Tatsuki started to laugh at Rukia's irritation; Ichigo got up and headed for the exit of the restaurant.

"C'mon, we've gotta get back to searching."

"Right," the other three got up and quickly followed him.

"So, where so should we start?", Orihime asked as she looked around the area.

"Maybe we cou-", Tatsuki's sentence was cut off by loud bang that seemed to come from the docks. A large, black cloud of smoke soon raised up into the air.

"Probably over there, if I had to guess…", Rukia looked at them for a few seconds.

"What are we waiting for? Let's go!"

* * *

"Wait!", Rukia stopped at a corner causing her teammates to stop dead in their tracks.

"What is it?", asked Ichigo, she signaled for them to look.

"Isn't that…", Tatsuki squinted as she attempted to get a better look at the masked soldiers that were currently occupying the area.

"The White Fang…". Ichigo shook his head as he saw large crates of dust being loaded onto airships.

"What the hell are they doing here?"

"I don't know but something tells that Blake is probably here," she looks back at her teammates and takes a deep breathe.

"Alright, Ichigo and Orihime go find Blake. Tatsuki, you and I will distract those grunts," they simply nodded in agreement to her plan. Ichigo and Orihime run off to the other side of the crate as Tatsuki and Rukia drew their weapons.

"Dance! Sode no Shirayuki," the White Fang grunts looked over at Rukia as she pointed her Zanpakuto at them. They started to laugh as one of them mockingly started to speak.

"Kids shouldn't playing with swords, why don't you put th-"

"Tsugi no Mai, Hakuren!", a large mass of ice erupted from the white blade and shot out at them. As it made contact, a large portion of the area was now coated in ice.

"What the hell!", a few grunts saw the large ice formation as Tatsuki jumped off the top of one of the large crates before striking them with her bo staff.

"Tatsuki, I've got the ones over here!"

"Alright, Let's do this!", her eyes narrowed, activating her semblance as she approached a group large group of grunts. Tatsuki slammed her staff into one's knee, knocking them onto the ground before she turned to strike the next one in the ribs. Two grunts attempted to swing at her, however she ducked as she split her bo staff into dual wakizashis; taking the opportunity she sweep kicked the two before slashing the next three grunts in their chest, arms, and stomachs and finishing with a swift wheel kick into their jaws.

* * *

Rukia launched her fist into a grunt's chest as she slammed the pommel of her katana into another;s gut before she slashing them down the middle.

"Quick jumping around damn it!", a grunt attempted to hit her with a downward strike, Rukia simply jumped over their head before striking them in the back of the neck with a heel kick. A few grunts approached causing her to sigh.

"I'm ending this. Some no Mai, Tsukishiro!", Rukia swung her blade causing a giant pillar of ice to emerge from a circle of frost, ensnaring them. As it shattered, Rukia scoffed.

"That was pathetic", footsteps could be heard as Tatsuki walked over with her bo staff resting on her shoulders.

"That was a bit underwhelming wasn't it?", Rukia chuckled a bit at her comment.

"Definitely," the two began to laugh a few seconds.

"Come on," Rukia turned around and began to walk to a different sections of the docks, "We better go catch up with those two."

* * *

Ichigo and Orihime saw a flare like projectile fly towards the roof of a building as the came across an open space.

"Orihime, distract however just shot that and then go check on the people on that roof," she nodded as ran towards a crate. She turned the corner and looked at an orange haired man.

"Koten Zanshun, I reject!", she ran her fingers across her hairpin and aimed at the man before launching a golden projectile at him. The man barely dodged the projectile as it cut through a crate before a golden triangular shield erupted from it.

"Wow, that was close!", the man looked Orihime right in the eyes and smirked.

"Sweetie, that was very, very close," he took a drag from his cigar before throwing it on the ground and stepping on it.

"But, no cigar," Orihime simply turned around and ran towards a building as Penny jumped from the roof of it and engaged with a few grunts.

"Oh no you do-", he stopped mid sentence as he saw a faint red glow from the corner of his eye.

"Getsuga Tensho!", the black and red wave of Aura crashed into the ground, destroying a large portion of it and threw the orange haired fellow about 13 feet back.

"So…", Ichigo got up from his crouched position and looked forward. "You're Roman Torchwick...gotta say you're pretty bad your job ain't ya?", Roman got up and dusted himself and glared at him.

"What's up with the mask? You know this isn't a costume party right?"

"What's up with the eyeliner? I thought this was a fight not a drag show," Roman winced at that last comment.

"Geez, kids these days are brutal," he stepped forward, "So, you're here for a fight? Then why don't you stop running yo-", his sentence was cut off as Aura began to erupt from Tensa Zangetsu and Ichigo darted towards him. Roman was nearly brought to the ground as Ichigo delivered an overhead strike, as he struggle to shift the odds in his favor Roman kicked Ichigo in the stomach and proceeded to swing his cane at him. Ichigo parried the blow flawlessly before punching him right in the jaw before smacking him into a crate of dust with the flat side of the black blade.

"Seriously, you dress like a rejected mob boss and you fight like a middle schooler," Roman clicked his tongue at Ichigo's comment.

"You better quit running your mouth if you know what's good for you kid," Ichigo chuckled a bit.

"Oh really now?", Ichigo cracked his neck, "Because the way I see it, I'm one who's currently kicking your ass right now," he grasped the blade tightly as a colossal amount of Aura began to pour out of the blade. He glared at Roman with his black and yellow eyes.

"Getsuga Tensho!", he swung the blade horizontally, unleashing a giant black and red crescent; Roman attempted to jump out of the way, he failed to completely remove himself from danger however. When the smoke cleared, his jacket was now ripped and missing an entire sleeve.

"Fuck! And I really like this jacket!", he shot a flare at Ichigo as he growled. Ichigo unleashed a nameless Getsuga to counter it, the two projectiles caused a rather large explosion as they collided and when the dust cleared, Roman was nowhere to be seen.

"Damn!", as he cursed his luck, a large green beam of Aura shot out from behind and after a few seconds an airship began to take off as Penny peruse it, launching a multitude of swords at it.

"This day just keeps getting better and better doesn't it?", Ichigo raised his hand to his face and dismissed his mask as he groaned.

* * *

Team RIOT sat down by the police tape with Blake, Ruby, and the blond monkey Faunus boy.

"I'm Sun, by the way," he put his hand to Ichigo, who looked at it for a second and then firmly shook it.

"I'm Ichigo," he pointed to his teammates, "This is Rukia, Tatsuki, and Orihime," they all proceeded to politely greet him as footsteps approached. Ruby looked over to see Yang and Blake approaching. She got up and walked over to Weiss

"Look Weiss it's not what you think she explained the whole thing you see she doesn't actually wear a bow she has kitty ears and they're actually kinda cute," Weiss ignored her and walked over to Blake.

"Weiss. I want you to know that I'm no longer associated with the White Fang. Back when I was-"

"Stop. Do you have any idea how long we've been searching for you? 12 hours. That means in that I've had 12 hours to think about this. Andin that 12 hours I've decided,,, I don't care."

"You don't care?"

"You said you're not one of them anymore, right?"

"No, I-I haven't been since I was younger-"

"Upupup! I don't wanna hear it. All I want to know, is that the next time something this big comes up...you'll come to your teammates, and not some…," she looked at Sun for a second, "Someone else," she looks at her teammates and wipes a tear from her eye.

"Of course," Ruby looked at Yang and threw her arms in the air.

"Yeah! Team RWBY is back together!", everyone starts to huddle together as Weiss turns to Sun and points her finger at him.

"I'm still not quite sure how I feel about you," Sun just nervously chuckles as Ruby looks around.

"Hey, wait a minute where's Penny?", they all look around and shrug as Ichigo speaks.

"I have no idea…"

* * *

"You guys go ahead, I'll be right in!"

"Alright, don't be too long!", Ichigo waved at his team and team RWBY as they headed back into the dorms. He sighed and leaned against a wall, looking up at the moon, he smiled slightly. He took in every detail from the night sky...however his gazing didn't last too long. A ringing could be heard as he snapped back to his senses.

"Who would be calling me at this ho-", he pulled out his scroll to see who it was, when he saw the person's picture he stood awestruck for a few seconds before quickly answering the call.

"Hello?"

"Hello, Ichigo. It's been quite some time hasn't it?", the voice on the line was very calm and smooth, they seemed to be in a rather good mood from talking to Ichigo.

"Yea it has...So, how is your mission going bro?", the voice chuckled a bit at the question.

"Well, the Grimm surrounding the village have nearly been completely wiped out...Look, I'd like to apologize to you Ichigo," he was taken back by these words.

"Apologize? For what! You've done nothing wrong!"

"I missed the tournament and you leaving for Beacon...and for that I am truly sorry," his voice was had a tad bit of remorse behind it, he was really torn up about missing it.

"Okay, if you feel that bad, then why don't you come down and visit me during the Vytal Festival? Mom, dad, Yuzu, and Karin along with a lot of other people from Karakura Town are coming to visit then!"

"Alright, I'll make sure that I'm there. It was nice speaking to you again, see you soon Ichigo."

"See ya then, Zangetsu," he hung up and sighed before looking behind him.

"Welp, might as well go turn in for the night."

* * *

AN: I was honestly hoping to make this a long chapter but I guess it just didn't work out for me. Unfortunately this chapter isn't longer than the last but hey what can you do? Also, I enjoyed the little insults that were thrown between Ichigo and Roman, thinking of how a fight between those two would go down was actually very entertaining for me. Two more things: 1) Orihime's semblance, I'd like to state that her semblance is Shun Shun Rikka and all of the abilities that come with it , just wanted to make sure that I am clear on this so there is no confusion on whether or not she only has certain abilities. Also her healing ability, Soten Kisshun, cannot really heal major or fatal injuries. For example if she were to heal a severed arm, it would only stop the bleeding and possibly close the wound, it would not actually regenerate the entire arm. 2) The appearance/ mention of Zangetsu! Zangetsu in this story will basically be Tensa Zangetsu in terms of his appearance and his voice. As for him being Ichigo's older brother...well, I wanted to incorporate Zangetsu in this story some way or nothing and I've never really heard of a story where Zangetsu is Ichigo's brother so, I figured I'd give it a shot! Well, thank you all for reading as well as your constant support of this story. 'Till next time!


	9. How Fun It Is To Be Young!

**How Fun It Is To Be Young!**

* * *

' _It's quiet today,'_ Ichigo couldn't help but feel a bit uneasy. The overbearing silence in the cafeteria was very unusual. The three teams, RWBY, JPNR, and RIOT, would be talking their heads off and goofing around when they all congregated in this room, but for one reason or another, that was not the case today. The silence was broken as Yang slid over to Blake.

"What'ca doing?"

"Nothing," Blake quickly closed the book as Weiss looked over at the two.

"Just going over notes from last semester," as she finished her sentence, Yang caught a piece of food in her mouth before turning back towards Blake.

"Lame!"

"Wow, she is accurate with that ain't she?". Ichigo looked over at the other two tables as Nora catapulted food from her table to Yang's mouth.

"It's kind of impressive," said Tatsuki; there was a loud bang as Ruby dropped a giant binder down on the table. Ichigo looked over at his teammates.

"I have a feeling that I'm going to be feeling sorry for Ruby's teammates in a second…", the four stared over at the table as Ruby cleared her throat.

"Sister! Friends! Weiss…"

"Hey!", shouted Weiss in a slightly offended tone as Ruby just continued with her little speech.

"Four score and seven minutes ago. I had a dream."

"This oughta be good."

"A dream that one day, the four of us would come together, as a team and have the most fun anyone has ever had, ever!"

"Did you steal my binder?"

"I am not a crook.", Blake looked over at her overly enthusiastic teammate.

"What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about kicking off the semester with a bang!", Yang turns to Blake.

"I always kick my semesters off with a Yang!", her teammates looked at her with a disapproving glare as the whole room could hear Ichigo groan from the pun. Yang soon got hit in the face with an apple as Nora 'booed' her.

"Look guys, it's been two weeks a good weeks, and between more exchange students arriving and the tournament at the end of the year, our second semester is going to be great! But classes start back up tomorrow. Which is why I've taken the time to schedule a series of wonderful events for us today," Ruby pointed to the giant binder on the table as Weiss stared at her.

"I don't know whether to be proud or scared of what you have in store," Yang then stood up and threw an apple across the room.

* * *

"I don't even wanna know…", Ichigo stared over at team RWBY's table as they had a conversation about...something. Suddenly a creampie collided into Weiss's face.

"What just happened?"

"I have no clue…", Tatsuki looked over at Rukia and then back at the other table.

"But, it's probably not gonna end well…"

* * *

"This is not going well," Ichigo looked over at the giant stack of tables and vending machines at the opposite side of the room. Nora laughed as she stood on top of the giant structure.

"I'm queen of the castle! I'm queen of the castle!", Ruby put one foot on a table as she squeezed a milk carton.

"Justice will be swift! Justice will be painful! It will be delicious!", team RWBY let out a battle cry as their leader shouted.

"Off with their heads," members of team JPNR started to descend from the stack of tables; Rukia shook her head and groaned as edible carnage ensued. Team JPNR began to launch watermelons as Yang put her fist inside two turkeys and began to punch the oncoming watermelons. Blake soon followed as she grabbed two loaves of bread and began to smash the flying fruit.

"How!", Ichigo leaned against a wall and pointed to Blake, "How is that bread not breaking?"

"It must be very stale…"

"I had some of it...I think I'm gonna be sick," Rukia cupped her hand over mouth as she watched Blake continue to bust through the melons. Tatsuki patted her on the back.

"If you ate some, then the loaf you had wasn't stale...well at least not THAT stale."

"She has a point," Orihime walked over to the two girls and sat beside them, "If the bread you ate was like that, then you probably wouldn't have been able to eat."

"Thanks Orihime that was…'reassuring'," Rukia made sure she put as much sarcasm as she could into that last bit.

"Weiss has a swordfish...when did this school even serve swordfish!"

"Maybe we just haven't seen it?", Ichigo turned to Orihime.

"We've been here for a semester. I'm pretty sure someone would have seen swordfish if they were serving," Orihime shrugged as Ichigo sighed.

"They have some really weird stuff here don't th-", he turned to see Orihime humming whilst spinning a leek. Tatsuki looked over at Orihime and stared for a few seconds.

"Hime...where did you get that?"

"Dunno, I think it flew over from over there," she pointed to where Weiss and Nora were currently fighting. Nora twirled her makeshift watermelon hammer around a few times before slamming it into Weiss's gut, sending her flying into a wall. Ruby caught her in a knick of time as a pillar began to collapse.

"Weiss! Weiss! Don't leave me! No!", Ruby was dramatically yelling as the pillar hit the ground and Yang rushed past her.

"They're really dedicated to this aren't they?", Rukia asked before bitting a chicken wing that flew across the room.

"You're seriously eating that?", asked Tatsuki as Rukia shrugged and took another bite.

"I'm hungry!"

"This is coming from the girl who was freaking out about the bread she ate possibly being stale," she pouted as Tatsuki said this.

"Oh piss off!" she took another bite.

"They're seriously doing this though," Ichigo slid down the wall into a sitting position as he watched Ren and Yang engage in combat...using turkeys and leeks. Yang uppercutted Ren with her turkey gauntlet as he went up in the air, he threw his leeks at her, somehow managing to stick them into the ground. Yang dodged the vegetables and jumped into the air before punching Ren back into the ground. As he hit the ground, Nora smashed her melon hammer into ground as she charged at Yang. Yang barely dodged an overhead strike from Nora as she went in for the kill. The two went to exchanged blows, Yang threw a hard straight but was cut off by Nora's upward swing, the watermelon exploded as it came in contact with Yang and sent her through the ceiling.

"That's gotta hurt," Ichigo winced slightly as Yang flew through the ceiling. The debris from the ceiling came crashing down towards Blake, who avoided it by performing a swift backflip and grabbing a large link of sausages for her new 'weapon'.

"They're very creative at least," said Rukia as she watched Blake strike Nora with the sausages, sending her flying into a vending machine. Nora hopped onto her feet and began to bombard Blake with shaken cans of soda that seemed to explode once they hit the ground. Blake barely avoided Nora's makeshift grenades as ran to the side, Pyrrah saw this and slammed her hand onto the ground, levitating the mass amount of empty soda cans before hurdling them at Blake. The barrage of cans pushed Blake off her feet and sent her flying across the room; Ruby looked back at Blake before looking forward with a determined look on her face as she went into a position similar to that of a runner. She took off at an extreme speed causing all of the food and cans to fly behind her. Ruby sped up, as the barrage behind started to move faster she zipped past team JPNR and skid to a halt as they went flying into the wall behind her, leaving a giant crack in the wall covered with soda and crushed fruits and vegetables.

"And that's why as a leader I said we weren't participating in this," Rukia puffed out her chest and held up her head as Ichigo and Tatsuki rolled their eyes before responding at the same time.

"Killjoy!", she looked back at the two and scoffed.

"Do you have any idea how long it would have took to wash our uniforms and get all of that food off of us?", she turned around and looked at the carnage around them.

"That time is going to be spent on better things like studying and training!"

"Oh?", Orihime stood up and walked over to Rukia, "So you like Ichigo and Tatsuki's training? That's great! We can all train in a bit, it'll be really fun!", Rukia's proud expression dropped as Ichigo chuckled and put a death grip on her shoulder.

"Yea, it'll be a lot of fun Rukia!"

"Please no...don't make me go back to that hell," Tatsuki started laughing.

"Too late! You said we should spend time training and studying! And we've already studied for this semester, so we're going to train now!", Ichigo looked over towards the door.

"Oh Sun's over there with some blue haired dude," Rukia slipped out of Ichigo's grip and laughed nervously.

"Oh would you look at that! We should go greet them! Come one!"

"Rukia, wait Goo-", Ichigo's sentence was cut off as Glynda bursted through the doors and growled before using her semblance to rearrange the entire cafeteria.

"Children, please do not play with your food," teams JPNR and RWBY stiffened up slightly as she spoke to them. Nora proceeded to belch as Yang came crashing down through the ceiling, causing the two teams to roar up in laughter. Glynda gritted her teeth and growled again as they started to laugh, but Ozpin put his hand on her shoulder in attempt to calm her.

"Let it go," Glynda sighed before looking at the two teams again.

"They're supposed to be the defenders of the world."

"And they will be. But right now they're still children. So why not let them play the part?", Ozpin began to walk towards the exit .

"After all, it isn't a role they'll have forever."

* * *

The two walked over to team RIOT with smiles on their face and crushed food on their clothes. Ruby tilted her head and giggled a bit.

"Why didn't you guys join in?", Yang rushed up to Ruby's side.

"Really! It was a lot of fun!", Tatsuki stepped forward and sighed.

"We would have but Miss Killjoy Kuchiki over there said we couldn't", the other two teams raised a brow at Rukia.

"I am not a killjoy! I made a decision as a team leader that we didn't have the team to spend washing our uniforms!", Ruby and Yang busted out laughing.

"Really? Weiss joined in and she's WAY more stuck up than you!"

"Hey! I am not stuck up!", said Weiss in a slightly offended tone.

"Sure whatever you say Ice Queen," the three teams began to laugh.

"Well, we'll catch you guys later. We've got training to do!", shouted Ichigo loudly.

"Please no…", Rukia screamed as Tatsuki and Ichigo picked her up and ran out of the cafeteria with Orihime trailing behind them as the short girl continued to yell.

"No! Please I want to live!"

* * *

 **AN:** **Another shorter chapter, hoping the next will be longer. Anyways not much to say here, just hope you guys enjoyed this chapter and see you all next time!**


	10. One Hell of An Entrance

**One Hell Of An Entrance**

* * *

"C'mon you need to run faster!", Ichigo shouted back to Rukia as she desperately tried to keep up with her teammates' ridiculous amount of stamina. She huffed and puffed before skidding to a halt and began to pant heavily. Her team soon followed her sudden halt, Orihime walked over to her and patted her on the back.

"Do you need a break?", Rukia fell to her knees and grabbed Orihime by her shirt.

"Yes...please!", Orihime turned to Ichigo and Tatsuki and nodded at them, the two rolled their eyes.

"Seriously?", Tatsuki spoke in a slightly disappointed voice, "We haven't been running for that long Rukia," the mentioned girl's head snapped up and stared at Tatsuki with a murderous gleam in her eyes.

"Haven't been running that long..."

"Oh no," Ichigo put his hands over his ears and sighed, "She's gonna blow."

"We have been running for four hours Tatsuki! Four fucking hours! We've probably been around Vale at least twice and then six times around Beacon! So don't give any of that, 'we haven't been running for long', crap!", Ichigo waited a few seconds before removing his hands from his ears.

"Is she done now?", Orihime clapped her hands together and nervously laughed.

"Alright, we've been going at this for...a pretty long time now. So, why don't we take a rest and then go get something to eat!", Tatsuki sighed at her plan but reluctantly agreed.

"I'm actually pretty hungry myself," said Ichigo as he sat on the ground.

"It's decided then!", shouted Rukia before immediately flopping back onto the ground, "I shouldn't have done that…"

* * *

Tatsuki and Orihime were currently discussing where they should go to eat as Rukia struck up a conversation with Ichigo.

"How do you guys have so much stamina? It's inhuman!", Ichigo chuckled a bit at her question.

"Well, since Karakura Town was by a lot of forested areas, we'd go exploring a lot. It satisfied that whole child like curiosity we had back then. Not to mention that when we were playing in the forest we really didn't have to worry about some of the adults yelling at us for getting in the way of their work, being in the streets, or even just stepping on their lawn or something like that," Ichigo laid back onto the ground and looked up at the sky. I was rather blue today and the clouds didn't seem really get in the way of enjoying the scene either. Put simply, it was a beautiful day outside.

"That sounds really nice actually," Rukia was genuinely surprised to hear about this, she couldn't really imagine Ichigo nor Tatsuki being so laid back.

"It was," Ichigo had a smile on his face as he continued to reminisce about his childhood, the lack of responsibilities, the hours of the day just simply flying by as the ran around the lush green forest.

"You said you didn't have to worry about being scolded in the forest. Wasn't there anyone supervising all of you?"

"Well of course there was. Most of the time it was just some of the older, more mature kids but they were usually just older brothers and sisters. We could get away with a lot more stuff where they were watching opposed to when our parents would," Ichigo took a breathe as the light breezed rolled by.

"I remember this one time when we were climbing the trees and I fell. My brother caught me right before I hit the ground, if not for him I would of probably broke an arm or leg instead getting off with a few scrapes and bruises."

"You have a brother?", Rukia shot up from her resting position after hearing his little tale from the past. Ichigo blinked a few times when she shouted.

"Oh, that's right. I've never told you about him did I?"

"No you haven't," Ichigo sighed and sat up.

"Well I have a brother who is seven years older than me named Zangetsu…", Rukia started laughing, "What's so funny?"

"Your Zanpakuto is named after your brother? That's hilarious!"

"Oh bite me you midget!", Rukia wiped a tear from her eye before coughing.

"I'm good now. Go ahead," Ichigo glared at her and took another deep breathe.

"As I was saying, I have a brother named Zangetsu, he was usually the reason why our parents would trust us to behave if our siblings were the ones watching us. He was really mature for his age and he was also really smart. We practically did everything together, he's also the one who taught me how to fight."

"Wait, your dad isn't the one who taught you to fight? That doesn't make any sense. I remember my brother saying that he used to be a higher ranking Shinigami when he saw him rooting for you at the tournament."

"Well, yea he was. He even took my mom's last name when they got married just so he could completely cut his ties with the Shinigami faction...I'm getting off track here, lemme continue now. My brother had to teach me because my dad wanted one of us to run the clinic when we were older and, needless to say I didn't want to, neither did my brother. My dad taught my brother how to fight after he said he wanted to be a Huntsman and my brother started teaching me in secret a few years later."

"Did your dad find out about you two going behind his back?", Ichigo chuckled at her question as the entire scene started playing out in his head.

"Yea, we were both so scared that he was gonna be mad at us...but he wasn't. Ole' Goat Chin was actually really understanding about and he that would have prefered if I would came to him about it instead of keeping it a secret. He started training with me though, mostly because my brother had to go off to a combat school and then a few years later an academy."

"Interesting, what school did he go to?"

"Here", Rukia nodded her head as if she just had an epiphany about something, "And that's why you decided to go here?"

"Well that was one of the reasons, but I came here mostly because of the lack of good academies around Karakura Town."

"What about Shin-", Ichigo raised an eyebrow at her, "Your dad cut ties with the Shinigami… and they're really strict about students being affiliated with their faction…"

"Bingo."

"One more thing," Ichigo sighed, "Shoot."

"If you have a brother then why was that one room completely empty?". Ichigo was silent for a few moments.

"I had a feeling you decided to snoop around the house," Rukia was getting a bit worried at the moment. She began to wonder why his tone was becoming so bitter, had she said something wrong? Was that room a touchy subject that had bad memories attached to it? She had no clue.

"Are you alright Ichigo? Did I say something that I sho-"

"No,no you're fine. That was my brother's room. He's a Huntsman now and he used whenever he comes to visit," the black haired girl became very confused at his statement.

"So...why did you sound so mad when I brought it up?", Ichigo turned around and glared at her.

"Because I'm still a bit mad at him for not coming to see me before I went off to come here," Rukia almost bursted out laughing.

"Seriously? That's it?"

"That's it."

"No family feud or anything like that?"

"Nope, nothing of the sort."

"Then how come you were mad at your brother for something so trivial?", Ichigo sighed and laid back onto the ground with a scowl on his face.

"It just pissed me off a bit, that's all there is to it. But I suppose he has to worry about his mission before certain events."

"I see...so do you two still talk? Or are you just being spiteful towards him?"

"I talked to him awhile ago, he said that he just got back from his mission and he's going to coming down with the rest of the family to visit during the Vytal Festival."

"That's rather nice of him isn't it?"

"Yea it is…", the two sat in silence for a bit. Ichigo however decided to break said silence with a simple phrase.

"Your turn," Rukia turned towards him with a very blank expression, "Huh?"

"I said it's your turn."

"My turn? What the hell are you even on about?"

"Well, I just told you about what my childhood was like and I even told you about my brother. So, I thought it'd only be fair if you tell about what it was like when you were growing up," he turned to her with a smug look on his face, "But I guess you had a bland and boring childhood if you're that hesitant to say anything about it."

"Oh no you don't. My childhood was much more interesting than yours!"

"Oh? Then why don't you elaborate for me."

"You're on Carrot Top!", she composed herself swiftly before clearing her throat.

"Well when when I was very young, our parents abandoned my sister, Hisana and I, leaving us to grow by ourselves in the 78th district in the South Rukongai, Inuzuri. Since the higher number district in the Rukongai have a higher crime rate Inuzuri was not a good place to grow up at. We were poor, hell most of the time we had to steal bread from some of the street vendors."

"Oh damn, you having a rough childhood is...well, unexpected…"

"I knew you'd say something like that," she glared daggers at him before continuing her story, "My sister left to go find our parents when I was 8 and during that time I made a lot friends with some of the other children from Inuzuri, and you know one of them."

"Lemme guess...Renji?", Rukia looked at Ichigo with a deadpan expression, "What! How did you guess that?", Ichigo shot her a deadpan look in response to her question.

"Are you serious right now? Have you seen Renji? He looks like one of those hard knock life, cliche delinquents from some drama show for teenagers!", Rukia couldn't contain her laughter after hearing Ichigo's mocking statement about Renji's appearance.

"You're actually spot on with that description!", Ichigo started laughing a bit, "I know I am! But, continue your story", the short girl cleared her throat as she tried to stop laughing.

"Okay, okay. So, I was best friends with Renji and his little crew for a long time after that. Unfortunately, Renji and I separated from them when we were 10. Since we lived in Shinigami controlled territory, we decided to test our skills...well since we were from Inuzuri, our luck, and applied to a preliminary program that was offered by Shino Academy that was meant to prepare future students for the combat school and the academy. Our ambitions were rather clear, we would become Shinigamis and reap the benefits from being apart of the faction, respect for the profession and the faction as well as good pay. It was a personal dream of our's!"

"And then what happened?", Rukia began to smile for some unknown reason, "We got accepted. The two of us couldn't even think about containing our excitement upon receiving the news. Not too long after our letters of acceptance were delivered, we received an escort to the academy by the one of the most respected and noble Shinigami clans, the Kuchikis. We were confused, as needless as it is to have to say that, but it all made sense when we entered our escort vehicle. My sister was courted by the head of the clan, they fell in love and married, then she confronted him about my whereabouts and begged him to search for me. And he found out I was still in Inuzuri after the academy informed him of my applications. Renji and I got into Shino and I was a noble, so, life was pretty good."

"So, you were a noble attending a high ranked academy reserved for the Shinigami?", Rukia nodded, "Then what the hell possessed you to come here?", Rukia sighed as remembered the little events that shifted her opinion on Shino Academy.

"The year before I would attend my first year at Shino's combat school program, Byakuya and Hisana had me come to watch the Vytal Festival tournament. The reason for this was because Byakuya had been personally tutoring one of the fourth year academy students. Apparently he did an exceptional job on tutoring this boy since he was able to release his Bankai, it was rather powerful actually but it was very unstable which caused him to save it until he needed it...so we unfortunately didn't get to see it until the final match where he lost miserably. The boy he fought was from Beacon Academy, Byakuya had always put down Beacon and made out the students out to be far less skilled than the ones from Shino, so, we all were surprised that someone from Beacon had actually made it to the finals. However, after seeing him fight it wasn't very surprising at all...he absolutely destroyed my brother's student…"

* * *

The final match was just about to began, the two combatants stood about 40 feet away from each other. The bulkier of the two had dirty blonde hair and eyes of a very dull hazel. He wore the traditional garb of a student from Shino Academy and a smug look on his face whilst the other, whom represented Beacon Academy, wore a black long coat with matching pants and dress shoes. The audience couldn't see much of his face due to the hood that hung over his head but they could see a few locks of black hair flowing in the air as a breeze rolled by.

"Beacon? What a joke!", the blonde boy chuckled as he drew his Zanpakuto, its Shikai was in the shape of a medieval executioner's axe with a red handle and flame like marking running across the massive axe blade. The Beacon stood placed his on the hilt of his black katana and narrowed his eyes at his opponent as the match began. The blonde ran at him and leaped up to strike him with a heavy overhead swing but his strike never contacted and he was instead launched by the black haired boy's opening swing.

"And you called me a joke...quite the hypocrite aren't you?"

"Shut the hell up!", he raised his axe and slammed the sharp point on the bottom of the hilt into the ground and growled in frustration.

"Ruin the land!", as he shouted these words flames erupted from the arena floor and quickly attempted to engulf his opponent. A triumphant grin came upon the blonde boy's face as he no longer could see his opponent in the wall of flames.

"You're open at the moment," he jumped at the calm voice and turned with a quick horizontal swing ready. Instead of what he anticipated, the heel of the black haired boy's shoe instead gave him a sloppy kiss on the cheek causing him stumble and nearly topple over.

"Your recovery time is shappy at best," a black blade was descending upon him before he even looked up. The blade missed his head by a few centimeters and instead smashed into his collar bone, inducing a large amount of pain. The next few seconds were merely a blur to him as the hooded figure punched him in the stomach before kneeing him in the nose and finishing off his assault with harsh two handed diagonal slash that made its mark as the blonde was struck in the chin and sent flying.

"Looks like I won't be having a real fight with you then," he growled at his hooded opponent before checking his aura gauge, it was in the yellow.

' _Not good, at this rate I'll lose! Oh man, Byakuya gonna be pissed if I lose to this guy!"_ , he struggled to get to his feet as he vision blurred a bit.

' _Shit, he must've hit me pretty damn hard in the head for me to have this much trouble getting up."_

"It's a shame that the final match was this much easier than the preliminaries. I feel bad beating you senseless so we don't you just forfeit?", he growled and jumped up to his feet and put a death grip on his Zanpakuto.

"Bankai!", the axe was engulfed in smoke and flames as it transformed into an obnoxiously large dual bladed war axe with a flaming tiger crest in between the blades. The blonde swung the axe, sending a huge wave of flames down the arena, his opponent easily outmaneuvered his attack and observed him as the weight the axe seemed to drag him forward. The black haired boy watched as his foe gripped the axe tightly and brought it over his head for another heavy handed strike.

"Unfortunate," flames erupted for a few seconds around the two before the blonde boy dropped onto the floor with a broken jaw and a shattered Bankai. The one blade flew into the air before dropping down to the arena floor at an incredible rate. The force from the blade passing his head caused the the black haired boy's hood to fall off of his head.

"It seems like that last strike had too much force behind it," he sighed deeply as his light blue eyes seemed to scan around him. The audience roared with applause as he sheathed his weapon and began to walk away from the arena.

* * *

"So you didn't catch what his name was?", Ichigo looked at Rukia with curious look on his face, "Don't they usually announce the victor's name at the end of the match?"

"Yes, but my brother got up and left as soon that second-year's aura gauge went from yellow to nonexistent and we had to follow him so we could try to calm him down."

"He sounds just like a damn ray of sunshine doesn't he?", Rukia chuckled a bit at Ichigo's extremely sarcastic statement.

"Yes, yes he does. Anyways, Byakuya tried to get the judges to disqualify the boy because of him breaking his student's jaw but since it was an accident, and accidental injuries happen a lot in combat, they refused. And since he couldn't get the ruling changed, he scolded him, poor guy couldn't even respond because his messed up jaw."

"Y'know, I'm gonna retract my sarcastic statement and just go out on a whim and say that: he is a fucking asshole."

"Watch it! That's my brother you're speaking about!"

"Isn't he technically your brother in law since your sister married into his family?"

"Well...yes but it find it easier to just call him my brother. But that besides the point! You can't disre-"

"Ichigo! Rukia! How do hoagies sound for lunch?", Orihime shouted just in time to stop a potential fight.

"Sounds good!", shouted Ichigo, Orihime nodded and turned to run back over to Tatsuki when Rukia noticed something.

"How does she run so fast? And how does she not get tired from it!", Ichigo stared at Rukia for a few seconds.

"I thought I told we were constantly running around the forest and climbing mountains and trees...I'd think that would answer your question," Rukia grabbed him by the collar of his shirt.

"You idiot! I'm not talking about that!", Rukia let him go and sighed, "She has certain 'assets' that seems like they'd make it harder to run that long…"

"You don't mean h-"

"Yes I do! Her breasts Ichigo! Her breasts are massive and they don't seem to slow her down one bit! How is that even possible?!", Ichigo's face went beet red as he turned his head away from Rukia.

"I don't know…", Rukia stopped shouting in disbelief and instead stared at him with a smug look on her face.

"What's wrong? Did I say something that caught your attention?"

"No!", Rukia got closer and looked even more smug than before.

"Could it be that you appreciate Orihime's figure on a more 'mature' and 'adult' way?", Ichigo's face got even redder to point where steam might as well be gushing from his ears. Rukia began to laugh at her orange haired teammate's embarrassment.

"I see how it is! Well, it's only natural that someone your age would be attracted to her 'charm'. Now if you don't mind I'm going to go tell Orihime what you think of her appearance," Rukia started laughing loudly as Ichigo gritted his teeth and growled whilst she walked away. The black haired girl's little joke would be cut short as Ichigo planted his foot in her rear end causing her to fall onto the ground as he sprinted passed her.

"You can't frame for these things if I get to them first!", Rukia groaned and started to run as well.

"This isn't over Carrot Top!"

* * *

"Just where do you keep finding these places Orihime?", Ichigo was extremely curious on how she continued to find all these places with good food.

"Well, I like to go find places that look like they have good food on my downtime and then I take you guys there! When we have the time that is…", Rukia held her stomach and groaned.

"I think I ate too much…", Tatsuki walked on by her with her head held high and smug look on her face.

"Looks like I was right, doesn't it Kuchiki?", the shorter of the two glared up at the other.

"Shut your mouth, right now…", Tatsuki continued her stride and he teasing causing Rukia to get a bit 'moody'.

"Alright, you two need to calm down," Ichigo put his hands in the pocket of his light blue jeans and began to walk ahead of the group.

"We had a good time and I really don't feel like dealing with all this sass," Tatsuki scoffed at his complaint.

"Look who's talking! You're like the damn king of being sassy and moody," he rolled his eyes at her and turned his head to face her.

"And as the king, I command you knock your shit off," Tatsuki bowed before him and made a sarcastic comment.

"Yes, your majesty."

"Tatsuki, for fuck's sake, knock your sh-", a loud noise came from above as they entered Beacon's courtyard.

"Airships?", Rukia tilted her head in confusion as she saw soldiers pour out of the vehicles.

"Isn't the Atlas military? Why the hell are they even here?", said Tatsuki as more soldiers began to position themselves on Beacon's campus.

"I think the headmaster at Haven is overcompensating for something. I mean seriously? Bringing your army with your students is dumbest thing I've ever heard of," Tatsuki hailed him once more as he spoke. Ichigo stopped for a second and looked at the smug look on her face.

"I think I see your point now…", Rukia and Orihime laughed lightly at Ichigo's loss at the hands of Tatsuki.

"Wait, we need to go to the library!", Rukia shouted with a tone of urgency.

"Huh, why?", her teammates asked in unison as she began to dart towards the building.

"We have that test in Oobleck's class tomorrow!", the other three froze before running at full speed.

"Ah shit!"

* * *

Team RIOT could hear quite a bit of commotion coming from the 'quiet' library. Upon entering the section where the noise was coming from, they saw team RWBY playing some sort of board/card game and team JPNR studying, they also saw Sun and his blue haired friend hanging around. Sun looked over and saw the newcomers, he grabbed his friend by the collar of his red jacket and dragged him to team RIOT.

"Yo!"

"Hey Sun, what's up?", Sun chuckled as brought his friend to his side.

"I'd like you guys to meet my buddy, Neptune."

"Sup," Neptune smiled as he greeted the team. Ichigo put his hand out as he greeted the tan boy.

"How ya doing? I'm Ichigo," Neptune grabbed Ichigo's hand and shook it. He winced a bit as Ichigo started putting some strength into the handshake.

"Wow, uh quite a firm grip you got there," the blue haired boy wiggled his fingers around to make that he still had feeling in them.

"Thanks, I get that quite a bit," Ichigo chuckled as Rukia stepped forward.

"I am Rukia, pleasure to meet you."

"Same here," the remaining girls, Tatsuki and Orihime, stepped forward and greeted Neptune.

"What's up, I'm Tatsuki," she greeted him with a high level of confidence in her voice.

"Hello, I'm Orihime. Nice to meet you," Orihime greeted him with her usual childlike innocence.

"It's nice to meet all of you."

"So Neptune, which school are you and Sun from?", the question was honestly killing Rukia, she just had to know. Sun popped right in front of Neptune to answer.

"Well, we're from Haven Academy," Rukia stared at Sun and Neptune with a suspicious look in her eyes.

"You know for being from Haven, you two seem to have very 'unique' uniforms," Neptune and Sun began to laugh a bit.

"We never follow that ridiculous dress code when we go on field trips!", Sun was nearly shouting at this point as Neptune wiped a tear from his eye.

"Yea, they tried to make us wear the uniform. Something about probably representing Haven Academy, but who cares! We said as long as we do good in the tournament then there shouldn't be any problems and they accepted that."

"I see", Rukia turned around and signaled for her team to follow her over to a table, "Well, we'll see you two later, we have some studying to do," Ichigo rushed over to an empty table and dumped the textbooks they were carrying in their bags onto it.

"Ichigo don't be so loud!"

"Well, sorry but we need to get this done, pronto!", the four quickly took their seats at the library table and began to look over the material for the test. The next hour or so was spent by team RIOT involved rigorous studying and quizzing each other to make sure everything was hammered into their heads.

* * *

 **AN:** **Well, folk there you have it! Rukia and Ichigo's childhood. I used Rukia's actual backstory from Bleach as an outline for how her childhood went in this story. As for Ichigo, well, I felt his childhood would be pretty normal with some unusual occurrences thrown in the mix. The flashback fight was actually very fun to write even though it wasn't a particularly lengthy fight scene. Also, the identity of the fighter from Beacon should be fairly obvious, if you can't figure who it is then wait because they will revealed in the most anticlimactic way possible. Thank you all for reading, 'till next time!**


	11. Friendly Competition

**AN:** **Okay, so before I start this chapter, I just going to say that this will be taking place during episode 5 of Volume 2. I re-watched episodes 3 and 4 in an attempt to see if I could include team RIOT in the events of either of those episodes and I couldn't see a place for them without the chapter just being filler.**

* * *

 **Friendly Competition**

* * *

Ichigo scratched his head as his teammates struck a random conversation, the meaning behind was completely unknown to him...but he had some sort of a clue.

"So, you guys going to that dance this Sunday?", Ichigo decided to ask his teammates about an event Yang told him about. They all looked at him with a puzzled look.

"What are you talking about?", Rukia asked in a slightly irritated tone.

"I didn't hear about a dance," Tatsuki said as tried to remember any conversations that pertained to a dance...well besides the current one.

"Of course!", Orihime nearly shouted in excitement as her two uninformed teammates stared at her dumbfound.

"What dance is he talking about Orihime?"

"Seriously I didn't hear anything about this," Orihime gasped at their words.

"How did you guys not hear about it! Team RWBY is planning a dance for this weekend!", Rukia and Tatsuki looked at her for a few seconds before...well letting their frustrations be known.

"And they didn't tell us?!", the two shouted in unison into the poor girl's face, Ichigo started walk again in an attempt to distance himself from the hell he had unleashed with his simple question.

"How did Ichigo hear about!"

' _Shit! I gotta get out of this situation ASA-'_ , his train of thought was broken by his two disgruntled teammates grabbing him by the collar and shouting the question in his face. The two glared at him as he tried to avoid the question, needless to say it didn't work out for him. He gave in rather quickly.

"Yang told me about it...Ruby and Weiss also swung by our dorm room when you guys where out. I honestly thought they would have told you...or you would've at least heard about it from someone else," Rukia and Tatsuki released their grip from his collar allowing Ichigo to once again breathe properly before cursing their immersion into their personal hobbies.

"I knew I should've put off training!", said Tatsuki dejectedly.

"I knew I should've have wait to go to that sale!", said Rukia in the same tone as Tatsuki...and then she proceeded to ramble, "But if I would've waited then I might've not been able to buy that new Chappie plushie and the keychain! And the scroll decoration! And the-", she was stopped mid-ramble by Ichigo swiftly kicking her in the rear.

"We have class!", his tone was a bit more aggravated than usual. The oranged haired teen scoffed before turning around and stomping off to class.

"We really should get to class…", said Orihime as she helped an infuriated Rukia off of the ground.

* * *

"Alright, everyone settle down," Glynda cleared her throat as she looked at the crowd of students.

"Now, for those of you that do not attend Beacon Academy, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Glynda Goodwitch, but you are to call me Professor Goodwitch. This class is based around combat training, while the largest purpose of the class is to help our students prepare for the Vytal Festival tournament, it also does help them improve their combat abilities, reflexes, and strategic thinking," Glynda reached behind her and pulled out a large scroll.

"Alright class pay attention, we will now select the combatants for the first match," Glynda press some buttons on her large scroll causing two holographic boxes to appear. The boxes appeared to contain pictures of the students that were currently attending the class, the pictures however were moving extremely fast similar to how the slots of a slot machine move after pulling the lever.

"The way students are picked in these sparring exercises is almost identical to the team selection process that is behind selecting the teams that compete against each other in the tournament," the first box slowed down and soon stopped on a picture of Ruby.

"Ruby Rose and…", the second box stopped on a picture of Ichigo, "Ichigo Kurosaki," the two looked up.

"Please, come down to the arena."

* * *

"Go Ruby!"

"C'mon Ichigo!", team RWBY and team RIOT were shouting, screaming to be more precise, words of encouragement to their competing teammates within two seconds of the pair stepping foot into the arena.

"Don't hurt each other!", shouted Pyrrah as the rest of team JPNR nodded in agreement.

"Don't worry!", Ichigo responded as he drew Zangetsu from off of his back. Ruby unclipped Crescent Rose from her belt and with the flip of a switch, the metal, red box turned into a giant scythe that was much larger than she was.

"Begin!", Ruby shot forward like a bullet as Glynda announced the start of the match. As she approached, Ichigo put the flat side of Zangetsu to face her, Ruby halted her strike and dug the heels of her boots into the blade before bouncing off of the massive blade. Ichigo rushed at her as she flew towards the wall, Ruby slid across the ground a bit as she landed, however that was not her biggest concern at the moment. Zangetsu descended upon her as she looked up, Ruby attempted to counter but Crescent Rose proved itself to be no match for the sheer force from Zangetsu's strike as she was nearly sent flying across the room from the power behind the blade. Once she gained her bearings, Ruby darted at Ichigo once more, this time she managed to land a five strike combo on various sections of Ichigo's upper body before finishing it off with swift horizontal slash across his cheek.

Ichigo stumbled back a bit as he was smacked across the face by Crescent Rose, Ruby went to rush him once more but was instead met by an upper diagonal blow from Zangetsu, which in turn sent her flying a few feet into the air. As she began to fly back to the ground Ruby noticed a slight blue glow from the corner of her eye.

"Getsuga Tenshou!", using her semblance, Ruby barely managed to dodge the crescent of Aura by half of an inch and planted herself on solid ground relatively unscathed. She lowered herself and dug her boots into the ground before launching herself at Ichigo and jumping behind as soon as she was two inches away from him. As he turned around, Ruby was half way into a vertical strike, but her strike did not connect with Ichigo and instead connected with Zangetsu. The two began to exchange blows with each other, it got to the point where the spectating students found a pattern in their strikes. For every five to eight blows that Ruby landed on Ichigo one massive blow would delivered from Ichigo.

Even though Ruby's attacks didn't take massive chunks from his Aura gauge, Ichigo still began to worry. Though it was true that each time he would manage to land a successful attack on the younger girl that he would take a decent bit of her Aura away he still worried. His attacks weren't frequent enough and with the overall size and weight of Zangetsu they wouldn't be frequent enough.

' _If this keeps up, she might just end backing me into a corner here,'_ this thought along with many similar ones began to rush through Ichigo's head as he continued his coordinated exchange with Ruby. It needed to end and that was what he was going to do.

"Getsuga Tenshou!", Ruby's eyes went wide for a second as she heard these words, she halted her incoming attack completely and hopped back as Ichigo swung his massive blade and unleashed yet another large crescent of blue Aura. While she managed to escape from the attack another thing happened that was not that great...dust, it seemed to come from out of nowhere and fill the entire arena when the Getsuga exploded. The cloud of dust was moved out of the way as Ichigo swung Zangetsu down horizontally and pointed the blade at Ruby.

"Bankai," black and red Aura engulfed Ichigo momentarily and when it cleared, revealed a very familiar black katana. Ichigo rushed at Ruby and swung Tensa Zangetsu at her head. Ruby seemed to barely dodge the strike as Ichigo continued his assault, the two once more began a coordinated exchanging of blows but, this time neither side seemed to receiving any of the strikes. As the sleek black blade was swung horizontally it would be met by the giant scythe being swung in a similar manner.

The two combatants continued their exchange and Ruby noticed just how much her opponent's speed had increased. Each one of Ichigo's blow flawlessly corresponded with Ruby's, he was able to read her movements now.

' _That's not it,'_ Ruby thought to herself as parried another blow from Ichigo, ' _He's been able to read my movements the entire time, he just wasn't able to react to them. Was his weapon slowing him down? Then why didn't he ju-'_ , her little inner monologue was harshly interrupted by Ichigo planting his boot into her gut, sending her sliding backwards. Ruby glared at him for instant before launching herself him with a diagonal slash at the ready.

Her strikes continued to either missed completely or be parried with little to no effort on Ichigo's part. Ruby swung Crescent Rose in an upper diagonal, however the blade of the scythe was forced into the ground as Ichigo grasped Tensa Zangetsu with two hands and delivered a heavy vertical strike down onto the weapon followed by a single handed horizontal strike. Ruby stumbled back a bit as she tried to keep her balance but failed as she saw Ichigo rushing at her. His attacks were relentless, they came at her in varying speeds and powers, one horizontal strike was almost too swift for her to dodge while a vertical aerial strike had enough force behind it to send her flying into a wall.

Ichigo swung Tensa Zangetsu in an upward arc as he continued his assault, this strike managed to completely destroy Ruby's guard, she attempted to assemble some form of a guard as Ichigo rushed towards her. He began to unleash an onslaught of attacks at Ruby, she unfortunately only managed to parry two of them and dodge three, the rest of them connected with her body and the finisher landed perfectly in her ribs. Aura erupted from Tensa Zangetsu as Ichigo swung the blade at Ruby, when the strike connected he did not release a Getsuga, but instead treated the accumulated Aura as an attack booster. Ruby was knocked off her feet and landed harshly on the floor, she took a deep breath and looked up at the Aura gauges. Ichigo's was in the yellow zone whilst her's had just fell into the red.

"Winner: Ichigo Kurosaki," said Glynda in a slightly less than enthusiastic tone as Ichigo walked and helped Ruby back onto her feet. The class began to applaud the two for their match, with the most noise, unsurprisingly, coming from team RIOT, RWBY, and JPNR.

"Good fight," Ichigo smiled lightly and patted Ruby on the back, she chuckled a bit as they began to walk out from the arena.

"Yea, that was a pretty awesome fight."

* * *

Professor Goodwitch decided to allow the students to have a quick break, nothing too big though, it was meant to last around two minutes before she would resume the class.

"So, what you're saying is that your weapon drops in weight when you activate your Bankai?", Ichigo nodded at Ruby's question.

"Then just how much does Zangetsu weigh?", Ichigo stood there for a second and attempted to remember how much the weapon weighed, he had gotten so used to its weight that he had almost forgotten.

"If I remember correctly, Zangetsu weighs about 52 lbs and Tensa Zangetsu weighs...around...4.2 lbs," Ruby was shocked by this, as it was clearly stated the expression she wore on her face.

"That's insane! How would that even work?!"

"You know about katanas and what not right?", she nodded, "Do you know how the blades are forged?"

"Well, yea! Of course I do. They take a sheet of metal and fol-... Oh! I get it now! The steel from the blade folds itself. Am I right?"

"Right on the money," Ruby puffed her chest out a bit and let a triumph chuckle, "Also I'm pretty sure that's why the blade is flat."

"Well, yea," said Ruby, "If the blade folds itself then the blade would have to fl-", their conversation was interrupted by a familiar voice.

"Weiss Schnee and Rukia Kuchiki, please come down to the arena."

* * *

"Wow, it's Ice Queen vs Ice Queen," said Yang causing her and the surrounding students to chuckle.

"What are the odds?", Ichigo leaned on the railing overlooking the arena as he turned to Ruby, "Two people from our teams fighting in back to back matches," Ruby chuckled.

"Yea, that is kinda crazy," Ruby overlooked the arena as a grin formed on her face.

"Get her Weiss!", Ichigo shot a glance over at Ruby, who proceeded to stick her tongue at Ichigo in a semi-mocking manner. The oranged haired teen scoffed at her little gesture and turned to look down at the arena.

"Let's go Rukia! You can do this!", soon the teammates of both of the combatants began to shower them with words of encouragement.

"Fight well!", shouted Blake.

"C'mon, remember how hard you've trained!", shouted Tatsuki.

"Be careful!", shouted Orihime and the entirety of team JPNR.

"This ought to be good," Yang leaned over the railing and smirked as Rukia and Weiss could be seen entering the arena.

* * *

The two glared at each other lightly as Weiss drew Myrtenaster from its sheath and Rukia put a death grip on the hilt of her Zanpakuto and lightly grasped the scabbard. They sat in silence for a few seconds and got into their respective combat stances, although Rukia didn't go into a Kendo stance like she usual does. No, this time she held the hilt of her blade and the sheath containing it tightly and adjusted her stance so she would be lower to the ground.

"Begin!", as the words left Glynda's lips Rukia darted forward at Weiss. Weiss backed up a bit as Rukia raised herself from low posture to strike. As the blade began to leave the scabbard Rukia opened her mouth to speak.

"Dance! Sode no Shirayuki!", frost erupted off of the now white blade as it was fully unsheathed and flew right by Weiss's face, leaving frost to cover the white haired girl's vision. Weiss strained her eyes a bit as she attempted to look through the thick frost cloud, however it wasn't needed as a snow white blade shot through it and right passed her cheek. The frost cleared as Rukia brought her blade closer to her body and readied it for another attack. She charged at Weiss and brought the blade down upon her. Sode no Shirayuki made contact with the top of Weiss's head, the white haired girl gritted her teeth from the slight pain and swung Myrtenaster at the shorter girl. Rukia jumped back to avoid the swing; Weiss glared at Rukia, she summoned her glyphs and rushed at Rukia as she she grasped her Zanpakuto with both hands and got into a defensive stance.

The silver blade of Myrtenaster approached Rukia at rapid speeds, she stepped to the side and parried her opponent's strike. Weiss staggered back a bit, but she soon was back up on her feet and launched herself at Rukia and began to unleash a volley of high speed strikes from Myrtenaster. Rukia attempted to parry Weiss's strikes, however a few managed to strike her, she gritted her teeth a bit as the blade struck her. Weiss stepped back a bit as Rukia unleashed a upper vertical strike, the black haired girl brought the white blade to her side as Weiss used her glyphs to rush her once more.

"Some no mai, Tsukishiro!", frost began to leak from the snow white blade as it was swung in a horizontal arc. Weiss came to a skidding halt as a large pillar of ice erupted from a circle of frost in front of Rukia, nearly knocking the white haired girl off of her feet. The pilar quickly shattered as lightning plowed through it, large chunks of ice quickly fell to the ground and shattered as Rukia glared daggers at Weiss. The heiress wore a triumphant smirk on her face as she adjusted her posture to fit her usual fencing stance and brought her arm up to point the blade of Myrtenaster at Rukia.

The two girls locked eyes with each other momentarily and upon making eye contact with one another they felt something, it was an overwhelming sense of competition. The sound of metal clashing rang through the arena as they two darted at each other as a large flash of sparks emerged from the clashing of silver and white blades. Rukia broke away from the clash and crouched as she rammed the pommel of Sode no Shirayuki into Weiss's abdomen before grasping the blade with both hands and harshly drawing the blade in a diagonal arc across her opponent's torso. Weiss took a second to regain her focus after the harsh blow; she firmly dug her heels into the ground and summoned a large line of glyphs. Running forward, Weiss stepped onto one of the glyphs, sending her at Rukia at high speeds. Rukia saw this and quickly scrambled to get into a defensive position.

Rukia swung her Zanpakuto as soon as Weiss was within her range, though she was rather surprised with the results of her attack. Weiss spun around the attack and flipped herself off of Rukia's blade and into the air. During her descent, Weiss struck Rukia five times and upon landing she struck three more times before being interrupted by Rukia unleashing a small arc of ice from her blade. Weiss backed up as Rukia sighed and rose her blade to be level with her head.

"Tsugi no mai," Weiss stared at Rukia for a few seconds before noticing a large amount of frost accumulating around Sode no Shirayuki. Her eyes went wide as she realized what was going on and swung Myrtenaster in response, unleashing a large wave of fire.

"Hakuren!", a large mass of ice and snow erupted from the white blade as Rukia thrusted it forward. The attack shrunk a bit upon coming in contact with the wave of fire but, it didn't quite neutralize the threat. The wave of snow engulfed Weiss and launched her onto the ground as it dispersed. Snow slowly rained down upon the arena as Rukia fell onto her knees and began to pant. Weiss groaned a bit and sighed as she looked over the holographically displayed Aura gauges, Rukia's was just a sliver away from the red zone whilst Weiss's had just barely entered it. Glynda adjusted her glasses and stepped out into the arena.

"Winner: Rukia Kuchiki."

* * *

"Good job guys!", Ichigo seemed to be in a rather enthusiastic mood as Rukia and Weiss returned from their match.

"Seriously, that was intense!", yelled Yang as she walked over to Weiss and patted her on the back. The remainder of the three teams walked over to the two and began rain praise down upon them for a rather entertaining match. They began to laugh a bit as they talked about the events from a few minutes ago. Their joyus gathering was cut a tad short as Glynda quickly announced the next match.

"Pyrrah Nikos and team CRDL please come down to the arena."

"A team against one person?", Jaune was a bit surprised at the structure of the next match. Pyrrah was already heading down to the arena as was team CRDL, along with their usual confidence and poor attitudes.

"Yea, that seems a bit unfair to me," Orihime lifted her head a bit as she began to think more on the matter.

"For them," said Tatsuki whilst she began to stretch as the group chuckled at her comment.

"This either going to be interesting match …", Ichigo leaned on the railing and watched as Cardin turned to Pyrrah with his an over confident smirk on his face, "Or a one sided slaughter."

* * *

A massacre was probably the best way to describe it. Pyrrah absolutely decimated her opponents. Team CRDL seemed to be decently coordinated with each other in the beginning of the match, however they fell apart once Pyrrah began to step up her game. Cardin's hot headed behavior seemed to be a huge factor on the team's loss, he began to rush recklessly towards the end of the match. Cardin's temper even incited some villainous behavior on his end, when he was recovering from an attack, he smacked Dove in the jaw with his mace and with little to no regard for his teammates' well being at this point in time, he rushed at Pyrrah. Cardin did get some good swings in during his assault, good swings meaning well constructed strikes since they didn't seem to hit his red headed opponent, despite this the match ended with Pyrrah, with lack of better words, juggling Cardin in the air as she struck him and for her finishing maneuver she wrapped Miló around Cardin's neck in a way similar to a chokehold and slammed him into the ground upon her descent from the air.

"And that's the match," Glynda began to walk into the arena as she called the match. As she approached, Cardin groaned and raised his head to look at Pyrrah.

"Lucky shot", he proceeded to fall onto the floor. Glynda looked down at Cardin and began to praise Pyrrah.

"Well done miss Nikos. You should have no problem qualifying for the tournament."

"Thank you Professor," Glynda turned to the students and spoke as began to adjust some settings on her large scroll.

"Alright, now I know that's a tough act to follow but we have time for one more sparing match. Any volunteers?" she looked up from her scroll and straight at Blake, who was currently reading some book.

"Miss Belladonna?", Blake's head jerked up as she looked at Professor Goodwitch and quickly closed her book, "You've been rather docile for the past few classes," Blake averted Glynda's eyes as she continued to speak.

"Why don't y-"

"I'll do it," a grey haired Haven student by the name of Mercury raised his hand. Glynda looked at him and began to adjust her classes.

"Mercury is it? Very well, let's find you an opponent."

"Actually...I wanna fight…", Mercury held his hand up to his chin in thought before pointing to Pyrrah, "Her."

"Me?"

"I'm afraid miss Nikos has just finished a match, I'd recommend that you choose another partner," Pyrrah raised her hand and turned to Glynda.

"No, it's fine!", she turns to Mercury with a slight smile on her face.

"I'd be happy to oblige."

* * *

"Well, this is a good chance to see what the students of Haven are like in combat," Rukia turned her head to Tatsuki.

"I'd say they're probably pretty good. After all they are a high ranking Academy just like us," Tatsuki shrugged at Rukia's remark.

"I mean that does make sense," Tatsuki looked back over the railing.

"I just wanna know what we're gonna be up against during the tournament is all."

"I'm pretty sure Haven's going to have some pretty good competition for us this year," Tatsuki shot an odd look at Ichigo.

"What makes you say that?", Ichigo sighed as he stopped leaning on the rail and stood up.

"Well, they're is a few people that I know and I'm pretty sure they said that they wanted to go to Haven Academy," Tatsuki was much more curious now, she walked to Ichigo and intensely stared at him.

"Who?"

"Just a few people I met from those regional tournaments," Tatsuki leaned in closer to him with an extremely inquisitive look in her eyes. Ichigo abruptly put his hand on her face and lightly shove her back. Before she could begin to rain hell down upon, he point his finger up to his lip.

"Be quiet, the match is starting."

* * *

Pyrrah and Mercury were locked in combat. The two of them were desperately trying to get the upper hand over the other, however they seem to match each other blow for blow. Mercury unleashed a flurry of high kicks but this proved to be ineffective since Pyrrah blocked his strikes with relative ease with the use Akoúo̱. Pyrrah proceeded to dash forward and ram her golden shield into Mercury causing him to slide a few feet back.

Mercury looked at Pyrrah for a second before bopping his head and giving a "hmm" of approval. Up in the stands, Ruby turned to a darked skinned girl with mint green hair and bold red eyes.

"Hey, your friend's doing pretty good," the girl named Emerald gave Ruby a less than believable smile and let out a small giggle. The students were rather enthralled with the match at the moment, particularly teams RIOT, RWBY, and JPNR. Tatsuki turned to Ichigo, who was paying close attention to the match.

"Think I could take 'em?" Ichigo turned his head to the dark haired girl and shrugged.

"I don't know, he seems pretty fluent in the marital arts department. But it would make for a good fight regardless," Tatsuki blankly stared at him for a second before turning her attention to Pyrrah and Mercury. She sighed as she watched the two continue to duke it out.

"I could live with that."

* * *

Mercury's approach had become much more aggressive than it was at the start of the match. He rushed at Pyrrah, who had just locked herself in a strictly defensive position, and unleashed a swift flurry of kicks. The grey haired boy continued with a high kick, Pyrrah blocked the blow and went to strike him, however Mercury parried her attack with a sharp roundhouse kick, knocking Miló from her grasps.

Mercury smirked as the two of them looked over to Pyrrah's weapon, he rushed at her and went in for a wheel kick. His boot went right over Pyrrah's head and he stumbled a bit as he foot touched the ground. He stayed crouched on the ground for a second and thought about what just happened. Mercury looked behind as he stood up only to see Pyrrah rushing him with her shield. Upon impact, Mercury jumped onto Akoúo̱ and launched himself across the room from her. Despite him landing only a second ago, Pyrrah was already rushing at him once more.

Mercury stood up and turned to Glynda as Pyrrah continued her charge.

"I forfeit," Pyrrah gasped a bit as she ran right past Mercury.

"You, don't even want to try?", Mercury shrugged as she said this.

"What's the point? You're a world renowned fighter, we're obviously leagues apart," Mercury's voice came in a slight monotone as he said this. In response Pyrrah sent him a frustrated glare.

"In that case, Pyrrah Nikos is the victor of this match, again," Glynda sounded less than surprised when she said the last part. Mercury turned to the student stands and smirked as he looked at Emerald. Glynda turned to Mercury and pointed her hands on her hips in an authoritative manner.

"Next time you may want to think a little harder before choosing an opponent," Mercury waved at her as he began to walk away.

"I'll be sure to do that," a buzzer began to beep causing Blake to snap out of her half conscious state.

"That is all for today! And remember the dance is this weekend, but you all have your first mission on Monday."

* * *

Team RIOT walked out of the main building, Ichigo groaned a bit as he began to crack his neck. Orihime walked over to Ichigo and cocked her head to the side.

"Is something wrong?", Ichigo shrugged at her question.

"Well, y'know the dance that's coming up?"

"Yea?", the orange haired girl's expression began to light up.

"I don't think I'm going to go…", Orihime's expression changed to one of disappointment.

"Well, uh, I'm not really the dance type of guy and uh…"

"Is that all?"

"Well, I, uh, don't have anything to wear…"

"I'll ask Ishida!", Ichigo's eyes shot open and his head snapped towards Orihime.

"What!"

"Yea, I'll ask him to make you a suit!", Ichigo grabbed Orihime by the shoulders.

"Don't! I don't want four eyes walking around like I owe him something!", Tatsuki rolled her eyes as she heard the conversation and walked over and smacked Ichigo on the back.

"Don't worry about it! We already asked him to make us some dresses. I'm sure he wouldn't mind making you a suit, we're just gonna need your measurements for when we ask him," Ichigo scoffed at her words.

"Fine, I'll do it."

* * *

"What do you mean a favor?", Ichigo shouted into his scroll causing Uryu to groan a bit.

"Look Kurosaki, I'll make you the suit and you just have to do one small thing for me alright?"

"Depends on what this "small' thing of your's is."

"Well, allow me to elaborate on the matter," Ichigo flopped onto his bed and rolled his eyes.

"Here we go," he muttered this under his breath right before Ishida began to explain everything.

"You already know that my father wants me to follow in his footsteps and take over as the head of his hospital. Well, as you may have guessed...I don't want to follow his footsteps, he also suggested following in our ancestors' footsteps and become a Huntsman but you already know how I feel on that matter," Ichigo groaned and lightly squeezed the top of his head and sighed.

"Okay…"

"So, I went through and researched different career paths and found the one most suitable to my interests. Fashion."

"You're kidding."

"Not at all Kurosaki, you know I don't joke around about serious matters such as this."

"You don't joke around at all."

"Which is precisely my point," Ichigo could hear Ishida adjust his glasses through the scroll, "I came to the conclusion that since I find great pleasure in sewing that fashion would most likely be the best field for me. And after a large amount of research, I came across an interesting factoid. One of the most well known names in current fashion has a shop that resides in Vale, Riruka Dokugamine."

"This concerns me how?"

"I found out that she is trying to break away from her usual Lollita designs and plant her foot into a more mature market. So, I need you to model some outfits that I have personally designs, with one of them being the suit I will be designing for your dance."

"You're not going to make me wear anything ridiculous are you?", Ishida scoffed at his remark.

"Of course not! Who do you take me for?", he took a deep breath, "No, I am going to have you model a variety of suits, tuxedos, and some casual clothing. So, do we have an agreement?"

"Yea, I'll do it."

"That's wonderful news!"

"But this better be a good suit or so help me Ishida, I will ram your fucking glasses down your throat," Ishida chuckled a bit.

"Now now, there is no need to get aggressive Kurosaki. I assure you that this suit will be to your liking."

"It better be," the call then ended, Ichigo sighed and looked over to the door to see a confused Rukia.

"What was that about?", he groaned a bit.

"I asked Ishida to make me a suit."

"Ishida is the one with the glasses right?", Ichigo nodded causing Rukia to laugh a bit.

"Oh man, how'd that turn out for you?"

"Well, he'll do it but he wants me to model some suits for some bigshot fashion designer"

"Really now? And you agreed to do that?"

"Unfortunately, yea."

"Well, good luck with that. I'm going to go help Tatsuki and Orihime bring some snacks back," Ichigo jumped out of his bed.

"Hold up a sec, I'll help you guys," He grabbed a blue hoodie and was currently putting on a pair of black canvas shoes as Rukia walked out and shut the door.

"Alright then. Just don't take too long or we'll leave you here!", Ichigo chuckled a bit.

"Got it!"

* * *

 **AN:** **IT'S FINALLY DONE! Now, I know this is like three or four weeks late and I'm extremely sorry for that, but I was very, very busy the last few weeks and I really hope you guys don't hold this against me. Well, anyways four fights in one chapter, three if you feel like the Pyrrah vs team CRDL was too undetailed to be considered a proper fight, but one thing I'd like to say is that this chapter is the first chapter I have written to have a word count of over 5k and I'm really excited about that! Also, one more thing I'd like to address would be Ishida's life choices. I thought about including Ishida in this story as a student of one of the Academies but then I thought about it and realized that Ishida might consider a less violent career field and then after taking his interests in sewing into consideration, I came up with the concept of him wanting to be a fashion designer. This idea stemmed from that episode in Bleach where he fixes Kon and then when he was done we find out that he also put Kon into a dress. Anyways, that's all for that topic!**

 **I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter despite its extreme tardiness and that you all will continue to read this story. 'Till next time!**


	12. An Evening Stroll (Snazzy)

**An Evening Stroll (Snazzy)**

* * *

The sky was particularly clear on this day, the temperature was also fairly moderate. These factors were the primary reason that Ichigo felt that a run would do him some good. Ichigo was breathing heavily as he came to a stop, he stood still at a street corner as he started to regain his breath and wiped the sweat from his forehead. He reached into his bag and pulled out a bottle of water and proceeded to drink half of it.

"Geez, how long have I been at this?", Ichigo pulled his scroll from his pocket to check the time, 3:04 P.M., he sighed and put the device in his pocket once more.

"Almost two hours now. Gotta say that ain't too bad," He put his arms above his head and stretched a bit before turning around.

"Probably best to start heading back now," Ichigo took a deep breathe and started to run back.

* * *

A rather pleasant breeze passed by as the orange haired teen was making his way back to Beacon. Despite him being a fairly fast runner, the trip back to Beacon would probably take at least 30 minutes at the pace he was going, after all Vale is fairly sized city. He slowed down as he came up to a small convenience store, the store was rather small, obviously a local business, there was one thing that stood out to him however. There was a picture of a young girl in a small silver frame resting upon on a small wooden table, surrounding it where candles and an assortment of various flowers.

"Those poor people, must've been tough for them," Ichigo looked at the store and shrugged before entering it. A bell chimed as he opened the door, he looked around to further inspect the interior of the store. There was a few aisles, around four or five to be more precise, one row of coolers that held some frozen foods and drinks that varied from sodas to some teas and coffees. There were also a few displays that held some name brand chips and other snacks as well as some candy that extremely geared towards kids.

"Good afternoon, may I help you find anything?", Ichigo turned around to see a Faunus woman, who looked to be in her mid-thirties. He looked at the counter she was leaning on, turns out this small corner store also has a deli up front. He looked behind the woman to see some signs that advertised a variety of different sandwiches as well as other foods.

"Yea, umm. Could I get a buffalo chicken sandwich and uh," he reached over to one of the displays and grabbed a bag of chips before quickly walking over to the coolers and grabbing a bottle of soda. He placed the two items down on the counter as the woman nodded.

"One moment please," she walked to the left of where she was standing and pulled some bread, meat, and cheese. She began to slice the bread as Ichigo patiently stood there.

"I take it you were out for a run? It'd make sense considering what you're wearing," Ichigo looked down at his clothes, navy blue tank top, black shorts with a purple stripe on the side, and a pair of neon green sneakers. He chuckled a bit and shrugged.

"Well y'know, figured a run would do me some good on a nice day like this,," the woman chuckled as she started to slice some cheese.

"I hear that," she looked at him for a few seconds as if she was inspecting him.

"Say, you're not really from around are you?"

"No, I'm actually from Karakura Town, it's a pretty big town in the mountains," the woman shot him an inquisitive glance.

"The mountains eh? You folks ever have any problems with the Grimm?", Ichigo shook his head.

"No, the Grimm don't really come near the town. Not to mention the Rukongai isn't too far away from us, so the Shinigami usually deal with most of the Grimm in that relative area."

"Shinigami, that Huntsman faction?", Ichigo nodded, "Well, at least Grimm aren't that big of a problem there. Anyways, if you're from all the way out there, then what are you doing in Vale?", Ichigo rubbed the back of his head when she asked this question.

"I'm actually attending Beacon," the woman's jaw nearly hit the floor.

"Beacon! You must be one hell of a fighter to make it into a school like that!", Ichigo chuckled a bit at her remark.

"So, how long have you owned this place?"

"About 11 years now. It was originally owned by my father but he gave me ownership in his later years," Ichigo nodded as she spoke, his eyes drifted towards the door. It seemed that the picture outside was still on his mind.

"I don't mind to be rude but, do you know anything about that picture outside?", the woman stopped what she was doing, the two stood there in silence.

' _Oh no, I shouldn't asked about that.'_

"If it's a private matter then it's alright if you don't want t-"

"No,no it's fine," she looked towards the door and sighed heavily before looking Ichigo in the eyes.

"That picture is of my daughter," the woman began to continue cutting the meat as she spoke.

"You see, she was a frail girl, constantly getting sick. Her father, who had just proposed to me when I found out I was pregnant, was a normal human, so it was actually quite rare that she came out without any Faunus qualities, Doctor said that she was going to be getting sick for a while but there was a good chance that she would start recovering."

"That must've been rough, I'm sorry to hear that."

"Oh it was, to make matters even worse her low life father ran out on us, decided that our daughter's health was going to hold him down," the woman took a deep breathe, these memories seemed to be quite painful for her to talk about.

"Found out he was cheating on me for three and a half years, told me himself when he left. And y'know something? That son of a bitch had the nerve to send a picture to us with a note on it. In the picture he was with a few younger looking women, turns out he went to Atlas and was partying instead helping me take care of our little girl. And yet he had the stones to write a message on the note telling my sick, little girl that he loves her and hopes she's okay."

"He sounds like a real dirtbag to me."

"I stopped caring at that point, all that mattered to me was that my little girl had food on her plate, clothes on her back and a roof over her head and she did."

"What happened to her?", though he asked Ichigo had a sinking feeling in his gut that the answer was quite obvious.

"Well, about a week ago her illness got the better of her...she passed," tears could be seen forming in the woman's eyes, her expression seemed vacant, like she lost any positivity she previously had.

"Oh shit. Listen, I'm really sorry for bringing up such a touchy subject," the woman wiped the tears from her eyes and waved off his remark.

"It's alright, it's better to actually tell someone about this rather than to hold all of it in. I figured that if I had said anything to some of my regulars they might've started to look for other places to go and business is not exactly booming at the moment."

"Oh? What made you change your mind?", the Faunas woman shrugged.

"You asked," Ichigo chuckled a bit at her response.

"Hey, if you don't mind me asking. What was your daughter's name?", the woman smiled a bit at his question.

"Her name was Elisabeth."

"Ah, that's a nice name," she nodded as leaned on the counter a bit.

"That is," she sighed once more, "It's a shame that I won't get to see her gr-", the conversation was cut short by some crashing noise outside of the store followed by some laughter. The woman rushed from behind the counter and looked outside. Curious, Ichigo shuffled over to the door and took a peek outside. A group of people were walking down the street cackling like a pack of hyenas, behind them was little memorial to Elisabeth in shambles. The woman rushed over to it and tried to fix it, unfortunately the table that held up the picture was completely broken. Ichigo scoffed and stepped outside.

"Hey!", the group turned to the annoyed teen, though now that he got a good look at them they don't appear more than a year or two older than him. One of them stepped, a lanky man with tan skin, he had a small goatee and clef with an assortment of piercing on his face and to top it all off, he had his head shaved except for his small swoop on the right side of his head.

' _He looks like some wanna be punk rock star,'_ the man spit on the ground as he was walking up to Ichigo. He raised his head in an extremely confident manner as he glared at Ichigo.

"You talkin' to us?"

"Yea, matter of fact I am," Ichigo pointed over his shoulder to the broken memorial, "You guys break that?", the man started to chuckle and his little clique joined him shortly.

"Yea," he leaned in closer to Ichigo, "Is that a pr-", his sentence was cut off by Ichigo punching him straight in the nose. He hit the ground and groaned as he clutched his face, his group walked over to him and helped him to his feets. The man glared at Ichigo.

"Kick his ass," the first to rush at Ichigo was a girl in a hoodie that looked three sizes too big for her, she reached into her pocket and pull out a switchblade. She swung it at him and missed miserably, the girl growled at Ichigo before rushing at him again. Ichigo cracked his neck as the girl ran at him, he intercepted her swing by grabbing her arm and punching her in the stomach. She went to rear over but her jaw instead met with the back of Ichigo's fist. He grabbed her arm with his free hand and threw her over his shoulder and onto the ground. Ichigo looked at the girl for a few seconds before hearing more footsteps heading towards him.

"Guess reptilian Faunas do exist," he turned around to short guys rushing at him. Ichigo ducked as the first tried to hit with a straight, he then turned and sprung up from the ground and elbowed the second in the jaw, causing him to topple over. Ichigo turned to the first who attempted to punch him and delivered a harsh roundhouse kick to his ribcage. The lanky man ran at Ichigo and threw a very sloppy haymaker at Ichigo, in return he sweeped the man's feet. He groaned as he hit the ground, as he looked up he could see Ichigo walking over towards him. A loud smack could be heard as Ichigo's shoe met with the man's jaw, he rolled onto his side and yelled as he clutched his face. Ichigo stomped his foot on the ground causing the group to look up at him.

"Apologize!", he pointed to the owner of the store. The group scrambled to their feet and shouted in unison.

"We're sorry for the trouble!", they darted off in the opposite direction as Ichigo sighed and walked over to the woman.

"Sorry for fighting in front of the store," he knelt down and picked up the pieces of the table. He held them up and turned to the Faunas woman.

"Here let me fix this for you," the woman smiled as finished reorganizing the candles and picked up the picture.

"Thank you, you're acting like a Hunter already, y'know that?", Ichigo chuckled a bit.

"Well, I guess I just like to help people."

* * *

A few hours had passed since the little 'incident' at the corner store and Ichigo was well on his way back to Beacon by this point. He slowed down as he saw the massive Academy in the clearing and began to move at more of a leisurely pace. He took a sip from the bottle of soda he bought and crushed it due to the contents of it being drained. Ichigo tossed the bottle into a trash bin as he walked by and reached into his pocket to retrieve his scroll; the first thing he checked was the time, 3:58 P.M., he shrugged as he read the time and went to put his scroll back.

' _Got back here quicker than I thought I would,'_ he was caught off guard for a second as his scroll began to ring.

"Who's calling me? I told them I'd be back so-...oh no," the oranged haired teen groaned as he answered the call.

"What is it Uryu?"

"Kurosaki, where are you now?", Ichigo scratched his head.

"What the hell do you mean? I'm on my way back to Beacon!", he turned and scowled at some of the people that sent him some mildly judgemental looks for raising his voice.

"Ah! Well, that's perfect actually. Come to your team's dorm, I have your suit."

"Wait, you're in Vale? With my suit and their dresses?"

"Yes, I don't see the problem with that."

"It's only been a few days! How the hell did you make all of that and get here that fast?!"

"Well, I am very dedicated to my work Kurosaki," his tone was as condescending as ever.

"Lay off with the attitude four eyes. Otherwise, those glasses just might end up where the sun don't shine."

"Tch, just get here soon. The appointment I made with Riruka is in 47 minutes and I want to be there early."

"Yea,yea whatever you say, kiss-ass," before Uryu could retort Ichigo had already hung up on him; Ichigo looked up and started to jog a bit in an attempt to get to Beacon before he had to hear anymore of Uryu's complaints.

* * *

"Alright, I'm here. Now let's hurry up a-", Ichigo's words chose to remain in his mouth as he was greeted by a rather pleasant sight. Orihime and Tatsuki were wearing dresses, Orihime's was a long, bright red ruffle dress whilst Tatsuki wore a more modest knee length purple dress.

"Am I...am I interrupting something here?", Orihime waved at him and smiled a bit.

"Not at all! Uryu just wanted us to pose for some pictures. He said he wanted to show them to a fashion designer he's meeting," Ichigo sighed as he saw Uryu walking over to him.

"And how come I have to come with your little meeting?", Uryu examined the pictures he had just taken on his scroll once more before putting it away.

"Because as I said before, you owe me a favor for making this suit. Especially since it was a last minute thing," he adjusted his glasses as Ichigo rolled his eyes.

"Whatever, let's just get this over with," he went to leave but was yanked by Uryu.

"Oi! What the hell is your problem!?"

"You're not going anywhere looking like that Kurosaki," Ichigo's expression deadpanned.

"You're kidding me," Uryu let go of Ichigo's collar.

"We are going to meet one of the finest designers in Vale and you're fine with going in the clothes you just went for a run in."

"I'm not seeing the problem here…", Uryu groaned as he began to rub the sides of his head.

"You are one of the only people I have honestly wanted to punch," Ichigo scoffed at his remark.

"You'd probably have a hard time reaching from down there," there was a valid point in his sentence, Ichigo had a good five or six inches on Uryu, it's not that Uryu is short Ichigo just grew a bit more before leaving for Beacon.

"Look, could you please just put something else on?", Ichigo sighed and shrugged.

"I guess," he walked over to his dresser and opened it up, "Just let me see what I have here," Ichigo grabbed a some clothes and headed into the bathroom to change before emerging a few minutes later. Ichigo tilted his head and put his arms out to the side.

"This good enough for you?", Uryu began to look over his outfit choice; he wore a white v-neck shirt with a blue jacket and black jeans accompanied by a pair of black canvas shoes.

"It'll do," Uryu adjusts his glasses and picks up a duffel bag from the bed and exits.

"Come on Kurosaki. We can't be late!," Ichigo shoves his hands in his pockets and hunched over a bit as he followed him out of the room.

* * *

It took the pair about 13 minutes to get within the general vicinity of their destination. Ichigo looked around, all he saw was shopping centers and other stores. However, the two seemed to be getting closer to the upper-class district of Vale. Uryu led him for a few blocks before coming to a complete halt.

"We're here," Ichigo sighed at his announcement and turned.

"Finally…", he looked up and cocked his head to the sigh, "What the hell is that?"

"It's our destination of course," Ichigo examined the shop, it was rather large and obnoxiously bright. The shop was called 'The Dollhouse', as indicated by the name being plastered in some classical royal font on a bright pink sign that could probably provide light for the entirety of some little mountain town.

"That sign is way too bright," Ichigo turned away for a second and covered his eyes, "For fuck's sake I feel like I just stared into the sun for a straight minute. Uryu looked over at Ichigo and sighed.

"Come on, we're going in."

"You're kidding?," Ichigo hopped up and pointed a finger at the shop, "I'm pretty sure this is a strip club or something! Just look at the damn sign! What kind of clothing store is called The Dollhouse?!", Uryu sighed and walked forward.

"Stop spouting nonsense Kurosaki," Uryu entered as Ichigo groaned and followed in with a deep scowl on his face.

"And it looks exactly like I thought it would," Uryu continued forward as Ichigo stopped and began to look around, examining his surroundings. The walls were sky blue and the floors were pastel pink.

"These colors...are hurting my eyes a bit," he turned his gaze else where and began to observe the type of the clothing of clothing that this store dealt. Ichigo was unsurprised however as saw that the store was lined back to front with a variety of frilly dresses along with other staples of Lollita fashion.

"I should take Yuzu here one of these days. She'd probably like something in here."

"Kurosaki! Get up here!", Ichigo rolled his eyes and followed the voice towards the front of the store. He was greeted with the sight of Uryu impatiently tapping his foot upon arrival. His bespectacled companion shoved the dufflebag he was carrying into the orange haired teen's hands.

"What the hell is this?", Uryu sighed and adjusted his glasses.

"That bag holds the different outfits you'll trying on and showing to Ms. Dokugamine," Ichigo made an extremely exaggerated facial expressions to show his disapproval of the whole situation.

"How many outfits are in this thing exactly?"

"Four if we include your suit for the dance."

"Alright, point me to a dressing room and let's get this over with," Uryu pointed to his left as Ichigo proceeded to sourly walk over to aforementioned room.

"Can I help you?", Uryu turned around to face the voice, it was a short young woman with red hair styled into twin tails wearing a black dress with a white blouse and a ribbon as well as a white hat.

"Oh, Ms. Dokugamine! It's Ishida, I made an appointment to show you some of my designs," Riruka looked at him for a few seconds before checking the time.

:Well, you're about three minutes early," she looked behind him, "Where's the guy you were bringing?"

"Oh, Kurosaki? He's getting into one of the outfits I designed right now," before either of them could speak Ichigo's voice came from the dressing room.

"Uryu! What the hell am I starting with here?!", Uryu groaned at his remark before responding.

"Go with the suit first! After that just pick whichever one you want next!"

"Gotcha," Riruka crossed her arms and narrowed her eyes as she glared at Uryu.

"Your friend doesn't sound very professional." Uryu felt his blood running a bit cold at the moment, nervously he adjusted his glasses before forming his response.

"Well, he's not really a model...he just owed me a favor," the redhead didn't ease her glare but instead raised one of her brows inquisitively.

"But, I assure you that he'll do just fine!", Riruka scoffed at his statement and walked to her left to retrieve a chair.

"So, tell me Ishida," she sat down and crossed her legs, "What does your friend do exactly?"

"Well, it's not really my place to say."

"Please, I insist," Uryu sighed deeply at her persistence.

"It would very rude, and not to mention a tad unprofessional, if I were to tell that to you without him giving me permission to do so," Riruka sighed and leaned back in the chair a bit.

"Well then, what's his name?"

"His name is Ichigo."

"Ichigo? Interesting name…" footsteps could be heard, the source would most likely be Ichigo approaching the two.

* * *

"Man, I really am not used to suits," Ichigo rotated his shoulders a bit and adjusted his tie. He opened the door and noticed Uryu talking with redheaded woman, who was sitting for some reason. Uryu raised his hand as if he was telling the woman to wait for a second before walking over to Ichigo.

"Kurosaki," Ichigo tilted his head as Uryu approached him, "I need to introduce you to someone," he shrugged and followed Uryu impatiently.

"Ms. Dokugamine, this is Ichigo," the redhead looked up from her seat with a sassy look on her face. Her eyes met with Ichigo's, nearly causing her to fall out of her chair. Ichigo grabbed her by the shoulders to help her regain her balance and ended up once again looking her straight in the eyes.

"Uh, you okay?", asked Ichigo in a very nonchalant tone. Riruka quickly removed his hands from her and leaned back in her chair a bit.

"D-does it look like I'm alright?!", her face was blazing red, which caused the two males to cock their heads to the side as they begin to question what could've caused this type of behavior. Riruka looked up at Ichigo, he wore a black suit with a red trim, underneath it was a dark red dress shirt with a black and grey stripe pattern tie. Ichigo blankly stared at her with a raised brow before sighing deeply.

"Alright then," he turned his head to Uryu, "So, should I go change into one of the other outfits?", Riruka almost immediately lunged out of her seat at the mention of more outfits and began to frantically wave her hands.

"No,no! That's quite alright!", she put her hands to her side and took a deep breathe.

' _If he stays any longer I might actually die!'_ , Ichigo rolled his eyes at the girl and went back to change into the outfit he had initially wore out. As he left the room the redhead seemed to gain her composure in an instance. She stood up from her chair and walked over to Uryu.

"Well, Ishida I see you have potential. So, I'm going to make a deal with you," Uryu adjusted his glasses and seemed to prepare himself for what she was about to say.

"I'm going to have you design some more outfits, you'll be in a hotel in Vale, paid by me of course. If I like what I see then, you'll be working for me."

"I see...I have one question however," she titled her head as he said this, "Is there a reason you only needed to see the suit? I had three more outfits prepared you know."

"Well, I-I just saw you had a lot of potential…", Uryu shrugged at her reasoning, figuring that he shouldn't pry any further.

"Uryu, let's go," Ichigo walked over to the two holding a small pink dress. He turned to Riruka and held up the dress.

"How much does this cost?", she leaned forward and closely inspected the dress.

"About 200 Lien," Ichigo groaned and handed her a card. After receiving the payment she took the dress and removed the tag before carefully placing it in a bag and handing it over to Ichigo.

"Thanks," he quickly grabbed the bag and proceeded to follow Uryu out of the store. Ichigo turned to look at the store once more before scoffing.

"Glad that's over. Felt like I walked into a little girl's idea of heaven," Uryu sighed at Ichigo's complaints.

"Can you stop over exaggerating? It wasn't nearly as bad as you say," Ichigo shrugged as he jammed his free hand into his pocket.

"Also," the orange haired teen turned to Uryu with a raised brow, "Is there a reason why you bought that dress?"

"Of course there is you four eyed jackass," he held the bag up a bit higher, "I figured I'd get Yuzu something for she comes to visit me with the rest of the family," Uryu nodded and continued on.

"Awfully thoughtful of you Kurosaki."

"I don't know what you're implying there but, if you wanna keep your teeth then you better shut your damn mouth."

* * *

 **AN:** **Sooooo, I haven't updated in awhile now but, I'm happy to present you with this new chapter. Nothing too exciting in this one, pretty relaxed compared to some of the previous chapters and some of the ones I have planned. Also, I'd like to take a moment and say that as of right now I am not going to have a consistent update schedule, at least for the most part. If something changes and I end up being able to update the story according to some sort of schedule then I will let you all know.**

 **Now, not much I have to say about this chapter overall but there are a few things I'd like to comment on real quick. For starters, the sandwhich choice was random and pretty the first thing that came to mind at the time and the whole convenience store debacle was something I wrote on the spur of the moment. Ichigo's suit was probably predictable for the most part but I did want it to compliment his battle attire; In this story Lien will pretty much be like USD, I was planning on making it similar to Yen but decided to change it.**

 **Alright now that all of that is out of the way, I hope you guys enjoy the chapter and the story so far. Be sure to leave a review to tell what I'm doing right and what I need to work on as well as any other thoughts or opinions you wish to share with me. Until next time.**


	13. Blowing Some Steam

**Blowing Some Steam**

* * *

Ichigo groaned loudly as he stared into the mirror, he wasn't too crazy about the whole idea of a school dance. He quickly adjusted his tie and fixed his collar before deciding that he was ready for the aforementioned event. With haste he reached for the door and exited the dorm room to find two out of his three teammates waiting for him. He looked around for second with a slightly confused expression.

"Either of you see Rukia?", Orihime quickly and cheerfully responded.

"She was going to put on her dress," Ichigo raised a brow at the statement.

"Wouldn't it make more sense her to get ready with you guys?"

"Pretty sure she had to go pick it up first," chimed Tatsuki as she proceeded to stand up straight. Ichigo shrugged and leaned back against the wall.

"I guess that makes sense," he reached into his pocket and pulled out his scroll. Within a few seconds he was typing vigorously. Orihime and Tatsuki looked at each other for a second before turning their attention back to him. Ichigo didn't seem to notice this and proceeded to type, seemingly getting faster by the second. Tatsuki cleared her throat in an attempt to get his attention but to no avail.

"Ichigo!", his head snapped up to face her, "What're you doing?", he shrugged and looked back down at his scroll.

"Nothing special, Yuzu and Karin just wanted to know how I was doing," Orihime made some sort of sound, a squeal of some sort.

"That's so cute!", Ichigo and Tatsuki looked at her with blank expressions.

"I guess? Anyways, Yuzu was curious as to what I've been up to and Karin wants to know all about Beacon, the training, the campus, even the curriculum," Tatsuki blinked a few times when she heard this.

"Damn...she must really want to go here."

"She does," Ichigo looked up at his teammates and put his scroll back into his pocket, "Y'know it's kind of funny…"

"What is?" asked Orihime with an inquisitive expression.

"Those two...hard to believe they're twins, they're just so different," Ichigo chuckled a bit, "Yuzu wants to be a chef when she gets older but Karin wants to be a huntress... I'll never get over that," he sighed and stood up straight.

"Sorry," he rubbed the back of his head and chuckled a bit, "Guess I'm just a bit homesick at the moment."

"No need to apologize," Tatsuki stepped forward, "At this point we're all probably homesick," Ichigo shrugged and looked around.

"Where the hell is Rukia? Seriously if she isn't here in the next two minutes we're gonna have to leave without her."

"Oh really?" the trio turned their attention to the source of the voice, Rukia wearing a long black dress with six inch heels.

"Mind telling us what took so long?", Rukia shrugged as she turned to Tatsuki.

"Had to pick up my outfit for tonight," Ichigo scoffed causing Rukia's attention to shift towards him.

"Is there a problem Mr,Strawberry?", Ichigo rolled his eyes and walked towards her.

"Oh nothing, nothing at all," he swifty poked her in the forehead causing her to lose her balance, however she was fortunate enough to be caught by Orihime before she could hit the ground.

"Alright come on everyone! Don't wanna be late," Ichigo's voice was dripping with sarcasm as he walked away.

* * *

The dance was quite extravagant, it was of a much higher quality than most would think possible considering the fact that it was arranged by first year students. The ballroom was adorned with elegant decorations giving the event a rather dignified charm. At the door stood Yang, keeping track of the attendees; she wore a large grin as she looked up to see the members of team RIOT approaching.

"Glad you guys could make it!", chirped the energetic blonde as she began to write their names on the list.

"Gotta say all of you look pretty nice, especially you Ichigo. Really _suits_ you, eh?", Ichigo groaned loudly at her attempted joke.

"Oh come on! That was gold," Orihime abruptly began to laugh as if she just got the joke, "At least she recognizes comedic genius when it shows up," Tatsuki patted Orihime on the head and walked closer to Yang.

"She's just a dork like that, so it doesn't count," in response Yang pouted causing Tatsuki to roll her eyes and proceed forward.

"We'll see you after you're done here alright?", Yang smirked and nodded to Orihime before looking over at Ichigo.

"By the way Ichigo, gonna need you to loosen up and stop being such a grouch," he sighed and began to follow the rest of his teammates, muttering under his breath.

"Seriously, I'm not in the mood for this shit."

* * *

"The decor is amazing! Weiss where did you get it? My sister would kill for all of this," Rukia and Weiss were currently occupying the area by the punch bowl, discussing the decoration and furnishings that Weiss had decided to use for the ball.

"Well you know how it is, being the heiress of the Schnee Dust Corporation does allow me to acquire some useful contacts. If you want to know where I got the decor from the-"

"Hold on for just a moment!", Rukia pulled out her scroll and brought Hisana's contact, "Alright, I'm ready," Weiss chuckled and went on to tell her what she wanted to know.

"Whad'ya think they're talking about?", Ichigo looked over at Yang as she walked over to the corner he was standing against. She grinned at him a bit, his focus quickly snapped back to Weiss and Rukia causing him to shrug.

"Dunno, I'd guess something to do with the setup of the dance. Nice job on that by the way."

"What did ya expect? Me and Weiss were the ones putting everything together," Ichigo looked around a bit before looking back over towards the bubbly blonde.

"Weiss? Well that explains the decorations," he turned to Yang and looked at her for a few seconds, "Y'know, I thought you of all people would've wore something a bit more...flashy."

"Something wrong with the dress?", she looked at her attire and smirked, "I thought it suited me pretty well," Yang pressed her arms together to accentuate some of her more noticeable assets. Ichigo looked at her for a few seconds before saying something.

"Nice hair," Yang tried to keep a straight face but failed miserably.

"Really? That's all you noticed?", she couldn't stop her laughter and continued to cackle, causing Ichigo to snicker.

"Well, you need to stop being such a pervert," the blonde punched him in the arm lightly and continued laughing.

"Stop playing innocent! You looked," Ichigo's face went as red as the alternative meaning of his name. He scratched the back of his head a bit as Yang grinned at him.

"Alright, alright, I looked for a second," the fiery blonde began to pat him on the back.

"Wow, look at that Ichigo! You've taken your first step to becoming a man."

"Oh shut up."

* * *

At this point the event had been going on for quite a bit and the guests had all began to become more and more immersed in the atmosphere. Most of the students were very social and eager to get on the dance floor...Ichigo was not one of these people. For the past a hour or two, Ichigo had been drifting around the ballroom and engaged in a conversation every so often. As it currently stood he had talked to every member of teams RWBY, JPRN, and RIOT as well as some of the upperclassmen.

"Oh, Ichigo," he turned his head to the side to see who was calling him. To his surprise it was Neptune, who just awkwardly waved at him.

"Hey, didn't expect to see over in the corner like this," Ichigo leaned back against the wall and took a sip from the cup of punch he had gotten a few minutes ago.

"So, there a reason why you aren't out there?", the orange haired teen pointed his thumb to the dance floor, which at the moment was occupied by a large mass of students. In response Neptune shrugged.

"Lemme guess…", Ichigo snapped his fingers and pointed at him, "Can't dance?" Neptune looked as if he was about to deny it but in the end he just admitted it flat out.

"Is it that obvious?", Ichigo shrugged at his question.

"Nah, just made sense to me," he took another sip from his cup and continued, "You have that whole cool dude thing going on, so why else would you be avoiding the dance floor like it's the plague."

"Huh, you the same?", Ichigo shot him a inquisitive look as he said this, "Can't dance either?"

"Dunno. Honestly, I never really wanted to try so, I never did.", Neptune nodded at his response and stopped leaning against the wall.

"Well, I'm gonna go get some fresh air, have fun man," he patted Ichigo on the back as he walked away.

"You too," Ichigo went to take another sip from his cup but soon realized that it was empty. He shrugged and made his way over to the punch bowl. The room seemed to a bit tighter for some reason, perhaps the amount of people and couples attending the event were to blame for this. Ichigo found himself sliding in between people a few times which made him feel a bit uncomfortable as he passed by. However, as he finally reached his desired destination he saw a familiar mass of orange hair come into view; he walked over to the girl and tapped her on the shoulder. She seemed to jump out of her skin as a reaction; she slowly turned around to face Ichigo.

"Orihime, what're you doing over here by yourself?", he looks around the room for a second, "I remember Rukia being with you a little a while ago," Orihime nervously chuckled at his statement.

"Well, she went to talk to Weiss about something, and kinda...drifted over here."

"That's unusual for you, you're normally very open to meeting new people," his voice showed a bit of concern, it was becoming increasingly obvious that he wished to know why she was acting so reserved all of a sudden.

"Well I ju-", her sentence stopped as she looked towards her left, "Ichigo look over there!", he rolled his eyes at her sudden request, thinking it was merely a way to change the conversation's current subject.

"Orihime, I'm not gonna fall for t-"

"No! I'm being serious; just look!", her voice was cracking, she seemed to be trying her damned hardest to keep from bursting out into laughter. Ichigo blankly stared at her for a moment before going along with it; he looked to laugh and nearly choked on his drink.

"Is that Jaune?!", he covered his mouth and fell onto one knee and began to laugh despite his best efforts not to. The source of his laughter was none other than the socially awkward Jaune Arc wearing a white dress with a ribbon tied around the waist.

"Why is he wearing that!", Orihime shouted before cackling at the blond's attire. She was practically in tears as she continued to laugh with Ichigo kneeling beside her, his condition seeming to be no better than her's. The two slowly wiped the tears from their eyes as they began to calm down before observing what else was happening with Jaune. To their surprise, Jaune took Pyrrah by the hand and walked over to the dance floor with her within seconds they were joined by Nora and Ren.

"Wait, did he wear that for Pyrrah?", Ichigo seemed to be taken aback at the thought, "That's weird, looks like it worked out for him though."

"They're actually really good dancers," Orihime watched as team JPNR continued to be the center of attention on the dance floor. She smiled and turned towards Ichigo.

"Hey, would you mind, umm, dancing with m-me?", her face was beet red, Ichigo looked at her and chuckled for a few seconds.

"Sure, I mean it could be pretty fun," Ichigo blushed slightly, he didn't expected to be asked to dance...he also was very worried about what he would look like whilst dancing.

"Come on, let's go!" Orihime wore a big smile on her face as she took Ichigo by the hand.

"I've made a terrible mistake…"

* * *

"Damn, dancing is exhausting," Ichigo felt completely drained, he had just spent all of his energy trying to keep with his energetic teammate. He now knew that fighting and dancing are worlds apart, and he was mostly going to stick to the first one. Orihime took a deep breath and turned towards Ichigo.

"See? That was fun wasn't it?", Ichigo chuckled a bit at her statement as he shrugged.

"I guess, I would do it again if you wanted to," her eyes seemed to light up at his response, "But, I think I'm going to go outside and take a quick breather."

"Oh, alright…", Ichigo lifted a brow as she looked down at the floor a bit dejectedly, "Hey, it's not like I'm going to leave, I should be back within a few minutes."

"Alright, I'll see you when you get back then!", he nodded and headed towards the door. The ballroom was still rather packed, the music had switched from some soothing orchestral pieces to more upbeat genres such as EDM, Pop, and some other forms of electronic music. The sudden shift in genres caused nearly everyone attending the event to make their way over to the dance floor. People congregated near the center waiting in anticipation for either their chance to be in the spotlight or to watch some of the more talented and rhythm oriented people have their fun.

"Finally, fresh air!", as he said this Ichigo bumped into Ruby, nearly sending her to the ground upon impact. She stumbled as she tried to maintain her balance in her heels, however it was for naught as began to fall backwards. Ichigo grabbed her arm and pulled back onto her feet.

"Sorry about that," Ruby shook her head as Ichigo tried to apologize for the recent set of events that had just transpired.

"No,no, it's fine! I really should've been watch where I was going," Ichigo shrugged and made his way towards the door, he noticed Ruby heading in the same direction as him and turned his head towards before attempting to strike up a friendly conversation.

"So, you trying to get a breather too?"

"Yea, kinda; this just really isn't my thing, the whole dancing and talking to a bunch of people," Ichigo chuckled.

"I know how you feel. I didn't even really want to come here tonight. But, those three said it would do me some good...well, Tatsuki said I need to stop being such a grouch and go to the damn thing but whatever," Ruby snorted as he said the last part, "Hey, what's so funny?"

"Nothing, just that sounds exactly like something she'd say," Ichigo sighed and put his hands in his pockets.

"That's because she did say that," the two of them smiled a bit as they heard the music get slightly quieter as they stepped foot outside. A calming breeze rolled by causing Ichigo to momentarily close his eyes and revel in it. His eyes quickly opened as he felt Ruby smacking him on the shoulder.

"What do y-", she pointed at the rooftops of some buildings across the street. Ichigo began to focus on them and as he did he saw a woman clad in black running atop them.

"We gotta go see where she's going," Ichigo nodded and turned to go back into the ballroom.

"I'll go get some backu-", he was cut off the sound of heels clicking against the sidewalk, he turned back to see Ruby running in the opposite direction.

"What are you doing? We can't just rush in there!"

"Ichigo, we need to go check this out asap!", Ruby turned away from him and began to sprint...however, she isn't quite accustomed to walking in heels, let alone running in them. She nearly tumbled over but caught herself at the last moment. Ichigo sighed as he walked over towards her.

"We'll do it your way; if you're alone you'll probably break your neck with the way you're walking",he walked over to Ruby, who quickly looked up at him with a determined expression.

"Let's go," the two quickly darted forward. Ichigo quickly looked over at the rooftops and saw that the woman was gone. He cursed under his breath and looked over at Ruby.

"What the hell could they even be after?", Ruby was silent for a few moments before the realization hit her.

"I mean the CCT is over here…"

"Oh no," said the two of them in unison. They began to speed up, their sudden epiphany allowed them to realize the motive of the mystery woman. They likely wished to sabotage the Cross Continental Transmission System (CCT), the very thing that allowed Vale to communicate with the other kingdoms. Should anything happen to it Vale would be in quite the predicament. The two didn't know why or how this woman was going to carry out her plan but they couldn't just stand by idly and let it happen.

* * *

Ruby and Ichigo came to a sudden halt as they reached the front of the CCT. The guards positioned outside of the tower were scattered across the ground. There was also no signs of struggle, whoever this woman was she was not one to be taken lightly. Ruby quickly reached for her scroll and entered the coordinates of her current location with Ichigo doing the same thing a second later. The two waited a few seconds before their lockers landed behind them. The pair quickly rushed to their lockers and retrieved their respective weapons, Ichigo throwing his suit jacket into his locker as he did this. Ichigo lugged Zangetsu over his shoulder as he turned towards Ruby.

"Let's hurry," the duo sprinted into the entrance of the tower only to be greeted by the sight of unconscious guards hastily scattered all around the room, the difference between the them and the ones outside was that there were clear signs of a fight, though it was obvious that it didn't last too long there was still some form of struggle on the guards' end. Ichigo and Ruby tensed up for a few seconds, they both knew that should they encounter this intruder that she most certainly wouldn't go down without a fight...that is if the two could even hold their own against her. When together, group of well trained guards would cause a bit of trouble in a fight or at the very least take a decent bit of time to dispose of, even for a Huntsman.

"Bankai," Aura engulfed Zangetsu momentarily before revealing the blade of a very familiar black katana, "We can't take any chances here so we need-"

"To be careful, got it," Ichigo took a deep breath as the two approached the nearby elevator. Ruby quickly hit the button to the top floor of the tower as they entered the elevator. The doors closed signaling that the elevator was now going to ascend. The pair of first years stood tautly as they waited, the fact that this woman was able to break into the CCT with such ease didn't sit well with either of them but, before either of them could begin to inquire or discuss the endless number of possibilities the elevator doors opened, abruptly snapping their minds back to the task at hand.

Ruby was the first of the two to exit the elevator, she began to look around the computer filled room as her grip on Crescent Rose began to tighten.

"Hello?," by this point Ichigo was already following close behind Ruby, the two didn't particularly care about the amount of noise they were currently making as they began to inspect their surroundings. With Ruby in heels and Ichigo wearing dress shoes there wasn't much they could do about the noise of their footsteps; they continued to move forward whilst carefully looking at everything within their range of vision then, Ruby once again stumbled due to her lack of experience with heels causing her to grit her teeth a bit as she quickly adjusted her shoe.

"Is anyone there?", they continued to move forward at the pace of snail, "Hello?", Ruby called out for the third time causing a woman to stand up from her current hidden position behind one of the rows of computers. Ruby looked at the woman as she turned to face her.

"Excuse me," the woman looked Ruby and Ichigo in the eyes, as she did this Ichigo could feel his grip on Tensa Zangetsu began to tighten immensely.

"You know it's not a masquerade party, so why don't you take of that-", her sentence was cut short by barrage of crystals flying towards her. Ruby quickly twirled Crescent Rose deflecting the projectiles before quickly digging Crescent Rose into the ground and firing a few shots at the intruder. She held out her hand and simply deflected the bullets as parts of her black attire began to glow bright orange and a crystal like pattern forming with it. The woman spun around quickly summoning a pair of black dual blades. Seeing this Ruby quickly leapt at the woman and attempted to strike her but, she quickly evaded the blow from massive scythe and in response materialized a black bow. Three arrows with glowing orange tips were then fired at the ground in front of Ruby, they detonated upon impact launching the young girl off of her feet.

The masked woman smirked as she saw the explosion, she turned to make her escape but was surprised when a black blade slid past her cheek. She turned to face her new opponent, a first year student with bright orange hair and a really attitude and a temper to match. She quickly summoned her dual blades once again and delivered a heavy handed counter attack which pushed Ichigo back a few feet. The sound of the elevator doors opening quickly alarmed her, she looked behind her opponent to see a smirking Ruby Rose with James Ironwood being the one exiting the elevator.

"Well, this is a problem," she spoke in a whisper as she said before looking behind her and seeing a row of windows, "Not for long I'm afraid." She went to run towards the windows but was once again interrupted by Ichigo. Being irritated at the turn of events that had already transpired she decided to end this little encounter quickly. With immense speed and grace, the woman quickly land horizontal strike on Ichigo's torso sending him skidding back a few feet. As he looked up Ichigo was greeted by a set of three orange tipped arrows speeding towards him. In an explosion of fire with a few accents of black and red Aura Ichigo was flung across the room, slamming into the elevator doors. He looked around the room as he struggled to his feet, seeing the masked woman has completely vanished from sight.

" **Damnit,"** he panted a bit as he finally got on his feet.

"A Vizard?", Ichigo's froze as he heard this, he turned towards General Ironwood who seemed to be a bit surprised and that's when the realization hit him with the same force as getting smacked by an Ursa. When the arrows detonated in front of him not only did he released a small Getsuga to lessen the explosion he also summoned his mask to strengthen his Getsuga to further lessen the damage. Ichigo sat there feeling a bit dumb as Ironwood continued to stare his mask which was now tattered, cracked, and broken in multiple places.

"Odd, Ozpin didn't mention anything about a Vizard attending Beacon," Ichigo just stood there and chuckled nervously before quickly dismissing the what was left of the mask. He began to dust himself off as Ruby rushed over to him.

"Are you okay?!", Ichigo winced a bit as he began to move his arms a bit more.

"Yea, I'm fine, just a bit sore...scratch that very sore."

* * *

"We're gonna probably get chewed out by Professor Goodbitch for being late you know that?"

"Naahh, we'll be fine," Ichigo sighed at Ruby stood beside him in the elevator with a giant smirk on her face. The two of them were on their way to the Headmaster's office to discuss the events of last night. Neither of them knew whether this was to be reprimanded or to be praised causing Ruby to a bit fearful of a repeat of the first time she encountered Professor Ozpin and Professor Goodwitch. They stood there for 16 minutes, thanks to all of the buttons on the elevator being pressed the two of them had to slowly wait for elevator to ascend and stop at each and every floor on the way to Ozpin's office causing Ichigo to be a bit mad at Ruby. The doors finally opened up at the very top floor causing Ichigo let out a deep sigh of relief. The two stepped out of the elevator and began to approach Ozpin's desk where General Ironwood and Professor Goodwitch where were standing.

"Sorry we're late!",

"Yea, apparently someone hit all the buttons in the elevator," Ichigo turned and glared at Ruby who calmly stared at the three officals dead ahead of her.

"It wasn't me," Ozpin quickly looked at the two as he lowered his folded hands from his face and stood up from his seat.

"Ichigo, Ruby thank you for coming. How are the two of you feeling?"

"Peachy," Glynda glared at Ichigo for the amount of sarcasm in his voice, he couldn't help it slamming your back off of elevator doors hurts.

"Pretty good," said Ruby cheerfully, "Would feel a bit better if my bad guy catching record wasn't 0-3," she let out a slight chuckle, however her little joke didn't seem to get much of a reaction. Ichigo leaned over to Ruby.

"You'd need a chainsaw to cut the tension in here," Ruby nods in agreement to Ichigo's remark before the two of them quickly look on ahead at Ozpin, Glynda, and James. General Ironwood stepped towards the two and placed a hand on both of their shoulders as he began to speak.

"I feel it's appropriate to let the two of you know that I think what you two did last night is exactly what being Huntsman or Huntress is all about. Both of you recognized a threat, took action, and did the very best you could."

"Thank you, sir," Ichigo and Ruby replied in unison, wanting to give the proper respect to the general. It wasn't long after that Ozpin began to speak once more.

"Now, the General here has already informed us of the events that transpired, last night. But, now that you've rested we were wondering if there is anything that the two of you would like to add," almost immediately Glynda turned to the pair to ask a question.

"Was anyone else with here? Did she look familiar to either of you at all?", Ruby looked to the side and began to speak softly as she tried to think.

"I-I don't know, she was wearing a mask and never said anything to me...but I know, she fought with glass. I don't think that was her semblance though. Her clothing lit up whenever she attacked."

"Save for the glass, she sounds like the woman I fought the night we met Ruby," Ironwood turned to Ozpin and began to speak,

"Imbedding Dust into clothing is an age-old technique. It could have been anyone."

"No," the three turned to face Ichigo, "She was way too strong to be just anyone. When I fought she managed to nearly destroyed my mask with a single attack not to mention overwhelm my semblance even with the power boost the mask gives me." As Ichigo finished his sentence Ruby looked over at Ozpin and Glynda.

"Wait, you think she's connected with Torchwick and the White Fang?", in a calm voice Ozpin quickly retorted.

"It's possible...but we still lack the required evidence to link the two together."

"Actually," Ruby began to speak in a somewhat nervous voice, "I-I think I remember her saying about a hideout or something in the Southeast. Just outside the Kingdom."

"Interesting," Glynda went to cut in but was interrupted by Ozpin, "Thank you two for your cooperation. Why don't the two of you go and spend some time with your teams?", Ruby and Ichigo looked at each other and shrugged before heading towards the elevator. As the elevator began to descend James turned to Ozpin.

"Before we continue to discuss this I have a question for you"

"And what might that be James?", Ironwood walked closer to Ozpin and looked him straight in the eyes.

"I was wondering why you didn't mention anything to me about a Vizard attending Beacon Academy," Ozpin sighed as he reached over to his mug and took a sip of coffee before standing up.

"I have my reasons James. I'll tell you them in due time But, I think we have a more pressing matter at hand, don't you?", Ironwood sighed as he walked to the window and look out at the city of Vale.

"Yes, that we do."

* * *

 **AN:** **Hey, it's an update! Over two months later...welp. First of all, I am definitely going to have apologize for this chapter taking so long, even though I said that update schedules were going to be very sporadic due to being busy with things in my personal life, I think a chapter taking over two months to complete and upload is way too long and I will try to get these chapters out to you guys in a much more timely fashion than I currently am. Also, this chapter was kind tough for me to write, I wanted to try to keep most of the character interactions at the dance focused on the members of team RIOT before the whole confrontation in the CCT. Anyways, I hope you thoroughly enjoyed this chapter, or at least enjoyed it a bit, and I hope you all continue to read. Leave a review if you have any pointers for how I can continue to improve this story or my writing in general or even if you just feel like leaving a nice comment. Until next time!**


	14. Coming Home

AN: Before I start the chapter, I'm going to say that I really did not expect that it would be around three months before I could even begin to start working on this story again. I have been incredibly busy and I apologize for the delay.

Edit: 8/16/17)) Okay, so, a lot of things have happened and I'm releasing this chapter a bit earlier and it is gonna be shorter than I wanted.

Coming Home

Ichigo threw his bag down onto the pile of the luggage that had already accumulated by the entrance to the Amphitheater. His teammates did the same as they entered the room. The four of them walked over to the large mass of students,

"Quiet. Quiet, please." Professor Goodwitch stood on stage beside Ozpin. The two waited for the students to pipe down before saying anything. Glynda cleared her throat as the students began to calm down.

"Professor Ozpin would like to share a few words before we begin." She walked off of the stage as the aforementioned man walked over to the microphone. He looked at the mass of students before speaking.

"Today we stand together, united. Mistrel, Atlas, Vacuo, Vale. The four kingdoms of Remnant. On this day nearly 80 years ago, the largest war in recorded history came to an end. It was a war of ignorance, greed, and of oppression. A war that was about much more than where borders fell or who traded with whom. But about the very idea of individualism itself. We fought for countless reasons, one of which being the destruction of all forms of art and self expression. As you all are well aware that was something many could not stand for." He paused momentarily.

"As a result, those who opposed this tyranny began naming their children after one of the core aspects of art itself. Color. It was their way to demonstrate that not only would they refuse to tolerate this oppression, but neither would the generations to come. And it was a trend that is held to this very day. We encourage individuality, expressionism, and unity. Through diversity. As I have said, today we stand together, united. But this bond cannot exist without effort. Which is way today, while the world celebrates peace, Huntsmen and Huntresses will work to uphold it. As first-year students, you will be tasked with shadowing a professional Huntsmen or Huntress on a mission. Some of you may be taken out of the kingdom for several days. Others will work within the walls for the rest of the week. But, no matter which path you choose, remember to be safe, remember your training, and remember to do your very best." The students began to applaud the speech as Ozpin walked off the stage.

Rukia led her team out of the Amphitheater and towards the area in which the students would be selecting their mission, Ichigo yawned as he raised his arms and rested them behind his head. Team RIOT's level of excitement varied from member to member. Orihime was easily the most relied up, while Tatsuki was more excited about the possibility of getting away from Beacon and the city of Vale for a week, While, she enjoyed her time at the school so far, she simply just wanted something different once in awhile, Rukia was more determined than anything else, she wanted to show her potential as a leader. Ichigo on the other hand, was indifferent to the whole matter.

"So, team leader what exactly are we gunning for here," he spoke in a very bored tone. Orihime seemed to be in shock at this. She rushed over to Ichigo and stood in front of him causing him to stop.

"How could you possibly be bored at a time like this?!"

"She has a point," Tatsuki spoke up as she walked over towards the two, "It's our first mission, so it would only make sense that we be relied up."

"We're only shadowing a professional, not l-"

"Stop messing around! We need to get a move on." Ichigo put his hands up like Rukia was trying to mug him. Orihime and Tatsuki simply began to walk once more, closely following Rukia. Ichigo jammed his hands into his pocket and followed the trio. The four saw the area where the students were picking their missions come into view. Rukia began to speed up, causing her teammates to match her speed. She suddenly bumped into someone, causing her to stumble back a bit.

"Oh, how convenient," the four looked towards the source of the voice, "I was actually looking for the four of you." To their surprise, before them stood Professor Ozpin. Rukia cleared her throat and stood up straight as she looked up at Ozpin.

"Professor Ozpin, what do you need?"

"Please, Miss Kuchiki there's no need to be so formal." He reached into his pocket and handed Rukia a letter. Ichigo, Tatsuki, and Orihime stared at Ozpin before looking at the letter in Rukia's hands.

"Allow to explain. I need the four of you to extend that invitation to the staff over at Shin'ō Academy. And since I know that your family and Ichigo's father are rather well acquainted, or in your case affiliated with the Shinigami faction that it would be my best odds of success in getting them to return back to the Vytal Festival." Rukia placed the letter within her bag before responding to the Professor.

"Alright then, who's going to be going with us? I assume that since the other teams are shadowing a Huntsmen/Huntress that one will be accompanying us as well."

"And you would be correct," the sound of high heels clacking against the floor could be heard as someone approached the group. The four turned their heads to see the person,

"Professor Goodwitch will be accompanying your team on this mission."

"Not without hesitation, however." Ozpin chuckled as he looked at Glynda, He walked towards her and took a sip from his mug.

"As I said before, it's imperative that you are there with them. I believe that you would likely be best suited for any type of negotiations that may arise." She nodded and began to walk towards the building's exit. She walked passed team RIOT before turning to look at the four of them.

"Come on, we have a long ride ahead of us."

"Understood," Rukia began to follow Professor Goodwitch, as did the rest of her team.

"Hey, Professor," Glynda turned to look at Ichigo. "About how long do you think it'll take to get the region outside of Rukongai?"

"Around a day or two, depending on how well the weather is." Ichigo sighed as he sunk back into his seat. He began to tap his foot as he put his arms behind his head. Silence ensued for a few minutes before Orihime spoke up.

"Would it be alright if we made a slight detour?"

"And where might that be Miss Inoue?" Glynda did not seem amused at the suggestion. Her voice held a slight tone of irritation in it. Orihime took a deep breathe as Professor Goodwitch continued to stare at her.

"To Karakura Town, just to stop in and say hello to everyone...It's in the same region as well so, it shouldn't take us too long." Glynda didn't seem convinced in the slightest.

"Miss Inoue, we are on a mission. We don't have the time t-"

"Professor Goodwitch if I may so bold." Her attention snapped to Rukia. "Karakura Town isn't any more than three miles away from Rukongai. It likely wouldn't put us behind schedule that much, if at all." Glynda stared at Rukia for a second before sighing.

"If that is the case Miss Kuchiki, then we may make a detour. However, we are not going to be there for more than a day, and that is only if we make it to that region in a timely manner." She stared at the four before speaking once more.

"Do I make myself perfectly clear on that?" They seemed to nod in unison.

The trip took a day and three hours. The Bullhead landed in the wooded area just outside of Karakura Town. Ichigo and Tatsuki were the first ones to exit the vehicle, seeming to be excited to be able to stretch their limbs once again. Rukia and Orihime soon followed them with Glynda not far behind. She looked at her scroll to check the time.

"Alright, seeing as we've made good timing so far, I will allow for the four of you to spend the night in Karakura Town. However, you must report to this location at 9:30. Tomorrow morning, do I make myself clear on that?"

"We understand completely Professor Goodwitch."

"Good, now run along then. I tend to some other matters regarding the mission." The four of them nodded and head towards Karakura Town. It took around five minutes to get there. Upon arrival, the four of split up. Orihime ended up bringing Rukia to her house since she lived alone. Tatsuki and Ichigo walked together for a short while before splitting off to go their separate ways.

Ichigo walked a few blocks before turning at a corner. The view was all too familiar to him. As he continued onward, a yellow building came into view. He knew the building well, yellow exterior with a green roof. A small parking lot was positioned right next to it and a few bushes were stationed in front of the building as well. A blue sign with a white font stuck out to him, reassuring him that he was home. As he came to the front of the building, he noticed something odd. The front door was wide open, though his home doubled as a clinic they usually didn't have many patients who were severely injured or anything like that. Most of the people who go in simply have colds, minor injuries, or other ailments that wouldn't require serious medical attention.

As he entered the building he noticed something, there was a few bags left by the door. A few plastic bags and a duffle bag. He decided that he would ask his parents when he saw them. Ichigo took a few steps forward, he still didn't see anyone.

"Anyone her-", his sentence was cut off by a lean, pale man with black hair and blue eyes stepping into the small entrance to his house. He wore a black long coat with a white button down shirt under it, accompanied by tightly fitting black slacks and a pair of black dress shoes. He grinned from ear to ear as he began to walk towards Ichigo.

"Ichigo! What are you doing home?"

"Zangetsu…" Ichigo was in a complete state of shock, his brother, whom he had not seen in nearly a year, was home once again. He quickly walked up to his sibling and embraced him. Zangetsu returned the favor, lightly patting Ichigo on the back before breaking free from the hug. He wore a light smirk on his face as he looked at Ichigo, examining him from top to bottom.

"Look at you! You seem so mature." He placed a hand on top of his head and moved towards Ichigo. His hand stopped at around the bottom of Ichigo's forehead. The raven haired man chuckled to himself as he put his hands to his side before shrugging.

"Maybe it's because you're taller than me now."

"Yea, I grew a few inches while you were away."

"Wait! Before I forget," Zangetsu knelt down and turned to the array of bags beside him. He began to rummage through the bags like a raccoon digging through a trash can. He slowed down and slowly stood up. He put out his hand to Ichigo and opened it. Resting in his palm was a wooden pentagon with a skull carved into with into with two bold black lines intersecting behind in an X shaped pattern. There was also a silver chain hanging from the top of it, allowing for it to wore around the neck, if one so wished to do so.

"I wanted to give this to you. Since I missed both you going to Beacon and your birthday, I figured that it'd only be right to give you something next I saw you." Ichigo nodded as he took the pendant from his brother's hand. He held it by the chain and held it up to his face. It was very well made to say the least, the wood looked extremely durable, not to mention the color was also very appealing to the eye. He flipped it over, there was a message engraved on the back. It read 'To my little brother, who's all grown up now. I hope Beacon treats you well.'

"Thanks, it's nice. It really is." Ichigo placed it around his neck. Before either of them could speak loud footsteps could be heard. They didn't sound like human footsteps, being as heavy as a herd of stampeding buffaloes. A familiar figure slid to a halt before launching itself at Ichigo.

"Welcome home Ichigo!" It was his father, who currently launching himself at Ichigo with a drop kick. Ichigo stepped to the side and slammed the door close, causing his father to crash into before sliding down the door in a rather comedic manner. He got up and groaned.

"I try to welcome you home and this is the thanks I get?!" Isshin's eyes welled up with fake tears as he spoke. He would do this often to try to make moment like this much more dramatic than then should be. Ichigo scowled deeply at his father and stuffed his hands into his pockets as he looked over at him.

"What kind of way is that to greet your son, you crazy old goat!? Also, when the hell are you going to shave that stupid thing?!"

"You need to stay sharp if you're going to attend Beacon! And I'll have you know that I am growing it out! Your mother say that it su-"

"Enough," the two of them looked over at Zangetsu, who wore a displeased scowl on his face, "I think we should go in and talk to the rest of the family. They're probably dying to know about Ichigo's time at Beacon thus far." He grabbed the rest of the bags and left the small entry way. Isshin sighed and followed him.

"C'mon let's get moving."

"Yea,yea, I got it."

Ichigo followed his father, he led him to the living room. Before him was the rest of his family, eagerly awaiting to greet him. Yuzu practically lunged at him, being lifted off the ground as Ichigo embraced. Footsteps followed by coughing could be heard, Ichigo looked over at the source of the noise. His mother, Masaki, was pale with bags under her eyes. He frowned a bit as he looked at her. She quickly embraced him, resting her head against his shoulder.

"Welcome back Ichigo," her voice was weak and rather rough. This worried him further, he remembered his mother's voice vividly from before. It was sweet and soothing to his ears, but now it scared him. He set Yuzu on the ground and his mother let go of him, stumbling back a bit. Ichigo grabbed her to make sure she'd maintain her balance.

"Mom, I think you should lay down."

"Don't be silly! I'm fine, after all you and your brother coming home on the same day, why would I ever even consider laying down."

"Masaki, just lay down for a few minutes. Ichigo gonna be here for a bit." Isshin wrapped his arm around her and led her upstairs. Zangetsu sighed as Ichigo looked around the room for a moment. He had noticed something, in this case someone, was missing.

"Where's Karin at?"

"Yuzu said she was with some of her friends from the academy. Said she'd be home in an hour." Ichigo sighed lightly and walked over to the couch before sitting down, Yuzu followed while Zangetsu simply remained standing. Ichigo leaned back and sunk into the cushions of the couch while Yuzu remained sitting upright. It was silent for a few moments before Zangetsu spoke.

"You're worried about mom aren't you?"

"Of course I am," he looked at his older sibling. "Didn't you hear how she sounded?" They remained quiet once more after that. A few minutes has past before anyone spoke. Ichigo reached for the remote as the silence was broken.

"She'll be fine," the two looked over at Yuzu. "She won't let something like this beat her. After all these years, there's just no way."

"You're right, I'm just being paranoid. Besides she has been sick for like the last two years and she has been fine every time we thought things were taking a turn for the worst." Ichigo turned on the T.V and switched to a comedy routine that was on at the moment, hoping it would take everyone's mind off of the darker subject they were discussing.

AN: Alright, I'm gonna apologize for how long this chapter took to get out. Now this chapter was supposed to be two to three times the length, however I have encountered some problems. Both my laptop and my desktop have busted, meaning that I don't really have a way to write at the moment. I have finished this chapter on my phone, but mind you typing a 6k or more word chapter on my phone would take much longer than it would on a computer. So, for now, I'm cutting the chapter a bit short and I'm going to see if I can get another laptop or desktop soon. If not, I will write the next chapter on my phone. For now however, I just wanted to get something out to you guys because you've waited way too long. Anyways, hope you guys enjoy this short chapter. Let me know what you think of the chapter and the direction the story's going in a review and I'll see you next chapter.


	15. An Important Announcement

**An Important Announcement**

* * *

 **Hello again, it's been awhile. As you can see I have not updated this story in a quite a few months now. At first it was simply because my pc and laptop had both died on me, which left with no means to write the chapters. I now have a brand new pc and can now work at a decent pace. Yes, I do plan to continue updating this story, it is a pretty fun way to pass the time and also allows to work on my creative writing skills in general. However, I'd like to clear one thing up immediately. This story is not going to continue the way it is currently.**

 **While I had no means of updating this story, I thought about it quite a bit. After awhile I realized something, I kind of hate what I've written so far. This is due to the way I've written the story for the most part, there are other things such as pacing and exposition but, the main reason was how I've written this. I'd like to try to correct this mistakes and continue the story but, to do this I need a clean slate. Instead of going through each and every chapter as they are and nitpick every single detail I don't like I am going to completely start over with the story. Certain concepts in the story will change as well as characters, some being scrapped all together. For example, Zangetsu will no longer be one of Ichigo's siblings in the new version. That was a stupid idea on my end, it being something that seems interesting or cool at the time but, as time goes on, it just becomes stale and boring, or in this case just ridiculous.**

 **I hope to have the first chapter of the new version done by tomorrow, possibly even tonight. I will not be deleting this version of the story either. Instead, I will just alter the title slightly so, new readers can easily distinguish the two. Or if an reader of this version wishes to go through it once more it will be there. This was a somewhat hard decision to make and I hope none of you are upset because of this. I will be using a similar title for the new version, so I hope to see you all there.**


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